


1,000 Points From Gryffindor

by blithelybonny



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Banter, Blow Jobs, Comfort, Community: hd_erised, Feels, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Humor, M/M, Shenanigans, Snark, a silly mystery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-06
Updated: 2016-12-06
Packaged: 2018-08-29 23:20:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 25,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8509465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blithelybonny/pseuds/blithelybonny
Summary: The story of how Harry Potter single-handedly lost Gryffindor the House Cup while attempting to have a “normal” year at Hogwarts. Featuring Harry's suspicious nature turned up to eleven again, a new DADA teacher who is so not here for Harry’s fame, multiple detentions, Slytherins being sneaky, Hufflepuffs being sneakier, and the mystery of Draco Malfoy's hoodie because seriously Hermione who gave that to him and is he wearing it just to torment me? This is ridiculous!





	1. The Leaving Feast, Part One

**Author's Note:**

> Dearest cylsus, happy hols! I hope the season treats you warmly and with all the joy and love in the world, and that this humble gift brings you some laughs. I had like twelve different ideas when I first read your request, and I think none of those ideas actually made it into this story, lol. But there is mystery and humor and dumb boys in love, and so it is my hope that you enjoy! <3 With thanks, also, to my fabulous beta E, who is an actual goddess and to whom I owe so very, very much. Finally, thanks to the mods for once again running this fest. You are stars.

“The banners are mocking me,” Harry said, glaring at a particularly offensive one hanging over the Slytherin table.

Hermione followed his gaze and then turned back around to narrow her eyes at him, while Ron scoffed and replied, “Right, _the banner_ over there is what’s mocking you, mate.”

“Yes, Ron, _the banner_ ,” Harry insisted. “I mean, I know this sounds petty and all, but Merlin, whoever told Helga Hufflepuff that yellow and black was an attractive color combination should be hanged.”

“Because that wasn’t a horrendous thing to say,” Hermione said on a gusty sigh.

“Fine, fine, I take it back. The hanging bit, though, not the black and yellow bit.” Harry shrugged his shoulders and reached for a roll from the bread basket. “‘S’only fit for bumblebees.”

“You’re _sulking_ , Harry, for fuck’s sake!” Ginny said, as she leaned across the table and grabbed the pitcher of pumpkin juice to pour herself another glass.

“I am,” Harry agreed, lips curving up into a smile now, “I am totally sulking.”

“At least you can admit it,” she replied, giving him a grin of her own. “Seeing as this is all your fault.”

Harry laughed at that, even as he picked up a handful of grapes and threw them at her in rapid succession. She caught one in her mouth and chomped it playfully, which only made him laugh harder. “Not entirely my fault,” he then said, “but…” He trailed off and glanced up at the House Points hourglasses above the Head Table; for the first time in over ten years, Hufflepuff had taken the House Cup, and its hourglass was practically overflowing with diamonds. Gryffindor’s measly fifty or so rubies paled in comparison. “I will admit that this is _largely_ my fault.”

“I had thought you’d managed to redeem yourself,” Hermione put in, leveling a stern look in his direction. “You were doing so well the last few weeks.”

“I was, wasn’t I?” Harry smiled at her. “Honestly, Hermione, it’s not like I go _looking_ for trouble. I think you know that better than most.”

“Yeah, I distinctly remember a certain Chosen One saying that he was planning on having a completely normal year, this year,” said Ginny.

“Right, as we were riding in thestral-drawn carriages--thestrals that almost everyone could see, by the way--across the grounds,” added Ron, “our Harry says that he’s going to have the kind of school year he always should have had.”

“Yes, and it seems _our Harry_ ,” Hermione continued witheringly, “severely underestimated his own capacity for normality.”

“I don’t suppose anything about this year was going to be normal, honestly. Not after everything,” Harry replied somberly, frowning gently.

Hermione opened her mouth to comment, but shut it again quickly and glanced at Ron. Ron dropped his gaze to his plate, staring almost resolutely until the emotion had passed. Harry’d seen him do it plenty of times this year--go off into his own head for a few moments to collect himself, as if stoicism was the only way to process his grief--and it didn’t hurt any less each time. It was likely going to be a very long time before the sudden moments of remembering all that had been lost didn’t hurt so sharply and intensely.

“Normal’s overrated anyway,” Ginny then said, her voice a bit hoarse, as if she’d had to swallow around the ache.

Harry gave her a soft smile and reached across the table to place his hand over hers. “Totally overrated,” he repeated, and she squeezed his hand gratefully.

“Well!” Hermione said brightly, bumping her shoulder against Ron’s. “At least we all thoroughly passed our NEWTs! And in a few weeks, it’ll be off to the Auror Academy, which is very exciting. I actually received the syllabus I’d requested from Auror Dawlish the other day, and in our first--”

“--leave it to our Hermione to already be planning our next set of schoolwork,” Ron teased. He leaned over, though, and pressed a smacking kiss to her cheek, causing Hermione to flush prettily.

“Well forgive me for being excited about our future,” she said, as she gave him a fond swat in return.

“Mood restored,” Ginny murmured, quirking her eyebrows at Harry. Harry nodded back at her, and she then jerked her chin toward the Slytherin table. “And speaking of moods…”

Harry turned and watched Slytherin’s slightly subdued celebration of the end of term. No one seemed particularly pleased about Hufflepuff’s win except Hufflepuff itself, obviously, which was probably to be expected, but having had much more to prove than the rest of the school, Slytherin’s defeat likely hit them a bit harder than normal. Malfoy, however, couldn’t have looked happier if he tried.

“Merlin, he’s so ridiculous,” Harry said.

Harry watched as he gestured animatedly, obviously in the midst of a story, and threw his head back laughing when he reached whatever punchline he’d been heading towards. Parkinson and Zabini across from him seemed quietly amused, and Nott at his side shook his head and went back to eating his dinner. Malfoy then turned, reached into his bag, and pulled out the hooded sweatshirt.

“Oh no,” Hermione said. “No, Harry, don’t--”

“I wasn’t going to say anything,” Harry muttered, his eyes never leaving Malfoy.

“Liar,” Ron said. “I cannot believe I’m about to say this, but can we please, _please_ have one meal without you going in on Malfoy?”

“I’m with Ron on this one,” Ginny said, eyes glittering with amusement. “As much as I love your Malfoy rants, I think we’re beyond them at this point.”

“Fine, fine, I won’t say anything...even though honestly, how is he still wearing it? It’s bloody June! Isn’t he boiling? It’s already warm in here, there’s no need for him to be--”

“--no ranting!” Ron cut him off.

Harry grumbled quietly, but held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “I’m shutting up, I promise.” He turned then in time to meet Malfoy’s gaze across the space between their tables. Malfoy smirked at him and lifted his hand in a teasing wave, just his fingers waggling back and forth, and even that only barely visible because his sleeve came up halfway over his hand.

“...and we’ve lost him,” Ginny said, shaking her head. “It was good while it lasted.”

With a growl, Harry rose from his seat. “That’s it...I have to know. No more mucking about,” he threatened.

“Wait, Harry no--”

“--no, Hermione, I’ve been waiting all bloody year. It’s time!”

“Mate, can’t you just--”

“--nope,” Harry aggressively popped the ‘p’. “Whatever happens now, please know that it was justified!” Then, ignoring, or rather barely even hearing, Hermione and Ron’s further protests, Harry strode over to the Slytherin table and loomed there until Malfoy stopped pretending not to notice him and looked up.

“Good evening, Potty,” Malfoy said faux-politely. “Bit drafty again in the Hall, isn’t it?” He punctuated it by pulling his bright yellow hood up and smirking like the goddamn cat that got the cream.

With his blood practically thundering in his ears, Harry opened his mouth to ask the question he’d been dying to know the answer to all year: “For Merlin’s sake, Malfoy, _why_?”


	2. 10 Points, for Running in the Hall

Harry’s plan to have a normal--for a given value of normal, of course--year at Hogwarts began well enough. Despite the continued efforts to rebuild after the Battle and the thick layer of tension and sadness that weighed so heavily at times it almost felt like being drowned, Hogwarts was still home to Harry. He was back in the Gryffindor dormitory with his best friends, Hagrid’s rock cakes remained essentially inedible even when dunked in buckets of tea, Quidditch practices were still enjoyably grueling, and the staircases continued to move around whenever they bloody well felt like it. It was even, Merlin help him, _nice and boring_ , which Harry found was exactly the way he liked it.

Well, perhaps the boring bit wasn’t actually all that great, but Harry was still attending a magical school, so it wasn’t like being bored at a non-magical school. At any given moment there could be an explosion, or a magical creature could get loose, or a Transfiguration mishap could leave someone with a dragon’s snout for an hour and a half.

Or Draco Malfoy could come down to breakfast one morning wearing a bright yellow hooded sweatshirt, patterned with black badgers along the sleeves and with the word ‘Hufflepride!’ emblazoned on the back.

“Everyone is actually seeing that, right?” Harry asked, after spending several long moments staring at Malfoy, waiting for what had to be some kind of mirage to resolve itself. “Everyone is seeing what I’m seeing?”

Hermione followed his gaze first. “That’s certainly unexpected,” she murmured, tilting her head thoughtfully.

“What’s he playing at?” Ron asked, eyes narrowed and tone low. Of the three of them, Ron had adjusted the least well to Malfoy's return to Hogwarts for eighth year. He was part of a pretty vocal majority, actually, of students who felt it was unfair that Malfoy had been given a pardon and another chance after all that he’d done.

Harry was much more ambivalent about Malfoy’s return to school. On the one hand, Malfoy had been dangerously stupid for the last two years, had followed Voldemort for much longer than he should have done, and had likely been saved from a prison sentence solely on the basis of Harry’s own testimony at Malfoy’s trial. All of which meant that even though Harry felt Malfoy deserved at least some leniency for his crimes, he didn’t necessarily want to have to see Malfoy ever again. On the other hand, though, Malfoy had always been a part of Harry’s post-Dursleys, post-ordinary life whether he liked it or not, and if the whole goal of this year was to experience Hogwarts at its most normal, Malfoy being his schoolboy rival, trying to goad him into a fight, and racing him for the Snitch had to be an integral part of that.

The truth was, it was difficult to hold a grudge against someone who’d experienced the bone-deep fear Harry had witnessed firsthand from Malfoy over the last few years. And while that fear certainly didn’t excuse Malfoy’s behavior, it did explain it well enough. Harry, as it turned out, was fairly well practiced in forgiving people for whom he maintained an active dislike.

“He’s probably just trying to get a rise out of whomever he can,” Hermione explained patiently, as she spread jam over a slice of toast, “so I’d suggest not paying him any attention whatsoever.”

Harry watched as Malfoy yawned fiercely and dropped his head down onto the table in front of him, his hood completely obscuring his face now. “Yeah, you’re probably...you’re probably right…”

“Oh bloody hell, look at him.”

“What--oh, Harry, no.”

Harry turned back around to see both Hermione and Ron leveling him with concerned looks, and the look he gave them in return clearly expressed a sense of ‘come on, really!?’. “You’re telling me that you’re not the least bit suspicious?” he asked, gesturing in Malfoy’s direction.

“A little, but definitely not enough to give a rat’s arse,” Ron said. “You’ve got your obsession face on, mate, and I’m telling you now, I’m really not in the mood for following that little bastard around the school all year.”

Harry frowned at him. “May I remind you that I was bloody well _right_ last time I wanted to follow him around the school all year?”

“Yeah, Harry, I remember pretty clearly,” Ron replied in a clipped tone.

Harry knew that he had to take care now, as he’d trod a little too close to a cliff’s edge for comfort. And honestly, he wasn’t trying to be insensitive at all--there were so many times when he, too, got hot under the collar or miserably sad when a particularly bad memory cropped up without warning. Malfoy was always going to be a sore subject for Ron, and that was understating it pretty profoundly. “Hermione’s got to be right,” he said quietly, by way of apology. “He’s just bought it for attention or something.”

Ron nodded, taking it for the olive branch it was, and then laughed a little. “Color’s pretty awful on him, at least.”

Harry glanced back at Malfoy again; he was sat up once more, although he did still look rather bleary-eyed and lethargic, as he reached for the jug of coffee and poured himself a rather large cup. “Yeah, yellow’s not a great look on him.”

“Unless it’s ‘faded-bruise’ yellow.” Ron barked a laugh at that. “Honestly, punching that sorry git in the face is easily my favorite thing that happened last year.”

Hermione piped up then, skeptically raising an eyebrow at him, “Really? _That_ was your favorite thing that happened last year.”

“Yup,” Ron replied, obliviously not taking the hint. “My knuckles were bruised for days afterward, but it was so bloody worth it.” He grinned dreamily, obviously lost in the memory.

Harry shared a look with Hermione, his lips curving up in amusement as hers twitched in fond annoyance. “The couple that punches together, or what have you,” he then said, shrugging his shoulders.

“Couple that--what? Oh…” Ron trailed off, the tips of his ears flushing red. He reached out and tugged Hermione over in a hug, smooshing a kiss against her hair. “I mean, of course, obviously my favorite thing about last year was you.”

Hermione hummed softly in a pleased sort of way, and Harry quickly looked away to avoid getting another eyeful. Not that he minded them snogging, of course; he just didn’t necessarily want to be up close and personal with their love-fest when he was trying to enjoy his eggs. It was also perhaps a bit possible that he might have been more forgiving of it if he’d been having his own love-fest.

Malfoy’d got himself some actual breakfast now, a plate full of eggs and bacon and a pumpkin muffin, but his hands, hidden inside his sleeves, were wrapped around his hot mug of coffee and he continued to sip gratefully at it. “Must not have got very much sleep last night,” Harry murmured to himself, as he observed.

Harry wondered if it was nightmares or insomnia. He’d experienced both a few times himself since they’d got back to school, and as much as Malfoy was, by virtue of being the only one left, his worst enemy now, neither were the sort of thing Harry would wish even on his worst enemy. Lying awake for hours, staring at the canopy of his bed, tossing and turning and just wishing that closing his eyes would bring some blessed relief was only marginally better than constantly having that sleep interrupted by vicious memories and horrible monsters that left him sweating and gasping for breath.

“It’s safe to look,” came Ginny’s voice suddenly from his other side. “They’re not trying to swallow each other’s tongues anymore.”

Harry turned back and grinned at her. “Thanks,” he replied with a wink, and laughed a little at the matched embarrassed blushes on his best friends’ faces.

The rest of breakfast passed uneventfully enough, with the small exception of Dean kissing Ginny good morning and then freezing in abject terror until Harry had told him that really it was fine, he and Ginny had parted ways amicably that summer, and if she was going to date someone, he was glad it was an upstanding bloke like Dean. If Harry kept sneaking glances at the Slytherin table to observe Malfoy’s dealings, well, he thought he wasn’t being particularly obvious about it, and no one else seemed to notice or care, so he was plenty free to do as he wished. And it seemed that what he wished was to figure out what the hell Malfoy thought he was doing.

Harry theorized that there were several possibilities as to why Malfoy had a Hufflepuff Pride hoodie: a) he’d bought it for the sole and specific purpose of annoying Harry because Malfoy was a prize git and might as well not be existing if he wasn’t annoying Harry; b) he’d bought it to make some sort of grand statement about House Unity in an effort to avoid the negative stigma of Slytherin House in general and his own reputation in particular; c) he’d stolen it from some poor, unsuspecting Hufflepuff because he was a miserable bastard and didn’t care about saving his own reputation; or d) he was shagging a Hufflepuff who’d given him the hoodie in that sweet possessive way couples had.

“Oh honestly, Harry!”

Harry blinked and turned back to Ron and Hermione. “What?”

Ron at least looked a bit more amused this time when he said, “You think any self-respecting Hufflepuff would stoop to having it off with Malfoy?”

Confused, Harry turned to Ginny, who shrugged and explained, “You were deducing out loud.”

“Oh, er, sorry,” he said, distracted by movement at the Slytherin table. He watched Malfoy get up out of his seat, stretch his arms luxuriously over his head, and then link them with Parkinson and Zabini on either side of him. Parkinson made a face, presumably because the badger pattern was touching her, and Zabini quickly unlinked their arms by giving Malfoy a shove that must have been playful, since Malfoy just laughed at him. “But come on, you have to wonder at least a little, don’t you?” Harry continued, even as his eyes followed the three Slytherins all the way out the Great Hall.

“I, for one, think it would be hilarious if he was shagging a Hufflepuff, but my money’s more on the whole ‘trying to make himself look better’ bit,” Ginny offered.

Ron pointed his fork at Ginny, and the sausage on the end of it flopped about as he emphasized his point, saying, “I think I’m with you too. He probably thinks he if he can make a big show of giving a fuck about anyone besides his own self, he’ll manage to make everyone forget that he’s the fucking worst.”

Harry frowned. “That’s a little harsh, isn’t it?”

Ron shook his head. “Nope, I think it’s pretty accurate.”

“Oh for heaven’s sake! Let’s please not give him the satisfaction of talking about it anymore!” Hermione suddenly cried, as she quickly gathered up her things and stood from her seat. “I don’t know about any of you, but I’m quite enjoying this nice, quiet, normal term, where we don’t have to chase monsters or fight petty battles or run round after Draco Malfoy because he might be up to something again just because he’s got a ridiculous sweatshirt on. So can we please just continue on that way? Please?”

Harry shut his mouth on whatever retort he was going to make to Ron, and Ron looked sheepishly down at his plate again. Ginny, the traitor, just gave a smile and turned back to start a conversation with Dean.

“Sorry, love,” Ron then said, reaching up to take her hand and give it a squeeze.

“Yeah, Hermione,” Harry echoed, “I’m sorry. I know I’m being...well, I don’t know. I’m just curious, I guess.”

Hermione regarded him quietly for a moment, and Harry felt the distinctly uncomfortable sensation he sometimes got when Hermione seemed to read him to his very bones. She then gave him a soft, almost misty-eyed smile and said, “Of course you are, Harry. Just...please be careful.”

“I’m always careful,” he replied, returning her soft smile.

“That is decidedly not true,” she teased him back.

“What are we talking about? Be careful about what?” Ron asked, looking back and forth between them.

“You know Harry’s going to be investigating, Ron, we might as well just let him at it.”

“Sod that, I’m just going to go ask him!” Harry said, and without waiting for the protest from Ron he was sure was to come, he jumped out of his seat and took off out of the Great Hall.

Malfoy, Harry knew, had a free period first today and would likely be heading to either the library or back to the Slytherin common room, both of which were in the same direction. When he exited the Great Hall, he looked down the corridor and saw that luckily, Malfoy, Zabini, and Parkinson were just down the way near the staircases. Not wanting to miss the chance, Harry took off at a run again--or he would have had he been taking better care to watch where he was going instead of barrelling into and knocking over Professor Flitwick.

“Oh bollocks, Professor, I’m so sorry!” Harry cried, as he stuck out a hand to help Flitwick to his feet.

“Mr. Potter, where on earth are you off to in such a damnable hurry?” Flitwick asked, irritated.

“I was just…”--he glanced down the corridor again to see that the Slytherin trio was watching him--“I’m sorry, sir, I just wasn’t watching where I was going.”

“Yes, yes, I can see that,” Flitwick responded tersely. “Well, I’m sorry to say it, Mr. Potter, but I’m going to have to take ten points from Gryffindor. You should know much better by now than to run in the halls.” His voice had softened somewhat by the end of it, and he looked almost sorry, even though Harry had absolutely been in the wrong and he knew it.

“I’m sorry, sir, it won’t happen again,” Harry promised and held out his hand.

Flitwick shook it and then reached up and patted Harry on the shoulder. “There’s a good lad,” he said, before he let go and then passed behind Harry into the Great Hall.

Harry looked down the corridor again, but Malfoy was gone. He’d missed his chance for now.


	3. 30 Points, for Disrespecting a Professor

Professor Wendell Applewhite, the new Defense Against the Dark Arts instructor, was thirty-years-old, tall, athletic, and like Gilderoy Lockhart had been before him, distractingly handsome. Unlike Lockhart, though, Applewhite was both extremely accomplished, as a former Auror with the American Auror service, and a competent teacher. Also unlike Lockhart, Applewhite’s only context for Harry’s multiple acts of heroism was of the detached ‘I read it in a newspaper’ variety, and therefore he treated Harry like any other student. It was such a welcome change of pace that Harry found himself looking forward to DADA with the same fervor he’d had for Professor Lupin’s lessons back during third year--even though so far the lessons themselves hadn’t taught Harry anything new.

It wasn’t Applewhite’s fault, of course, nor was it the fault of the NEWT-level DADA curriculum. But when half the NEWT-level students had fought in an actual war against Dark witches and wizards, it was likely going to be rough going trying to engage them with material they’d already used in practice.

Today was a practical lesson where they were in pairs working on increasing the longevity of their extra-strength, durable Shield Charms, and it was a genuine struggle for Harry to remain interested.

“I’ve got a new theory,” he called to Hermione, as he held his Shield against her onslaught of spells.

“About what?” she shouted back, before letting loose with three tricky little jinxes in a row.

Harry grinned across the room at her and answered, “About the hoodie, obviously.”

Malfoy had been relentless in wearing the Hufflepuff hoodie around the school, but Harry was no closer to figuring out why he was wearing it. It was mostly for lack of trying though; he hadn’t had many opportunities in the last couple weeks to just go up and ask Malfoy, which was obviously the easiest way to figure it out (although not exactly the most fun way). Hogwarts had settled into its fall routine, which meant getting ready for the first Quidditch game of the season, cozying up before the fire with cups of cider in the common room, and starting on Hermione’s truly epic revision tables for the NEWTs. Harry was mostly content with the small, normal things like that--Malfoy’s abnormality had to take a back seat.

But he hadn’t forgotten, obviously, not when he watched Malfoy sauntering around the halls between classes or out on the grounds all wrapped up in its admittedly cozy-looking, if ostentatious sleeves. Harry had also noticed that Malfoy was no longer solely in the company of Parkinson and Zabini (and sometimes Nott). His friend group had widened considerably, which was confusing, but surprisingly heartening because it was possibly a testament to just how badly everyone wanted to put the past behind themselves.

“Or, well,” Harry continued then, “it’s not so much a new theory as it’s _refining_ an old theory.”

“Harry, I say this as someone who loves you and cares a great deal for your general well-being,” she said, before hurling a particularly powerful trip jinx that rattled his Shield, “I really don’t care one single iota if Malfoy is shagging a Hufflepuff.”

Harry laughed brightly at that. “Damn it, Hermione, how’d you know?”

“Nice shot there, Hermione,” Applewhite said, appearing at her side before she could answer him. “Harry, I saw that slip. Remember the key to keeping your Shield up is--”

“--laser-precise focus, yes, yes, got it, sir,” Harry finished, adjusting his wand grip to compensate for her speed and strength.

“That’s right,” he replied. He’d only said it about fifteen times during the brief lecture at the beginning of class.

It was good advice, obviously, but something about it rang false to Harry--possibly because it was difficult to retain a laser-precise focus outside of the classroom setting. It wasn’t impossible, but in the midst of battle, a laser-precise focus on a single spell, even if that spell was for protection, wasn’t going to get a person very far. It might even get a person _dead_. “Hermione’s a crack-shot though, sir,” Harry then said. “There’s not many who’d be able to withstand her out in the field.”

“Thanks, Harry,” she said, grinning back at him.

“I can see that,” Applewhite conceded. Then, to Hermione, he added, “You’ll be a hell of a credit to your law enforcement.”

“Thank you, sir!” she replied brightly, and then turned and whipped a fierce _Reducto_ that caught Harry off guard, decimating his Shield and knocking him flat on his arse.

“Bloody good one, Hermione!” called Ron, impressed, from just down the line where he was partnering Neville on the exercise.

Slightly dazed, Harry pushed himself up to sitting, looked over at his brilliant friend, and saw her concern. He smiled and gave her a thumb’s up, saying, “Crack-shot!”

Applewhite crossed the space between Harry and Hermione and stretched out a hand to help Harry to his feet. “What’d I tell you?” he asked, chuckling lightly, once Harry’d righted himself.

“Guess I lost my laser-focus,” Harry answered with a cheeky grin. 

“Clearly,” he said. “Something I find that helps me personally is--” he cut off for a second, and then his expression changed, grew a little more serious. “You’re messing with me, aren’t you?”

Harry shook his head. “No, sir, of course not. I completely understand your point.”

Applewhite’s brow furrowed, but he nodded. “Just, you know, keep at it,” he said, and then started off to observe another pair.

“Although you might want to get a new metaphor, sir,” Harry couldn’t help but add, as Applewhite started off. He was teasing though, his tone bright and merry, and he laughed a little.

“What was that, Harry?” Applewhite rounded back on him and folded his arms across his broad, muscular chest.

“A new metaphor? The pure-blood students probably have no idea what you’re talking about,” he replied, still smiling.

“That so?” he asked.

“‘Fraid so, sir. But good on you for aiming at the Muggle-born students!” Harry laughed brightly and shot a glance at Hermione, who rolled her eyes, even as she smiled back at him.

“Ten points from Gryffindor for that smart mouth,” Applewhite said evenly.

Stunned by the suddenness of the mood change, Harry just gaped at him. It’d been a joke, surely Applewhite had seen that, right?

“Oi, sir!” Ron chimed in, jogging over with Neville on his heels. “Harry didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Yeah, sir, Harry’s just joshing,” Neville added. He jerked his chin in Harry’s direction. “Although, he’s also maybe a little right. I had to ask Holly over there”--he indicated a Seventh Year Harry assumed from context was Muggle-born--“what a laser was.”

“Do you think this lesson is beneath you or something?” Applewhite accused, ignoring everyone else’s comments. The rest of the class had stopped practicing and were all staring at the commotion.

“What? No! No, of course not, sir!” Harry insisted. He flicked a glance at Hermione, whose eyes were wide and concerned, and he suddenly felt a very intense déjà vu of interactions with Professor Snape, which unfortunately startled a very inappropriate laugh out of him. 

Applewhite's cheeks darkened with anger, and he narrowed his eyes at Harry. “Are you _laughing_ at me?”

For a moment, it was almost like Harry was outside his own body watching the slow-motion broom wreck of the interaction. “No, sir, I’m so sorry. I--I...I am so, _so_ sorry, sir,” he forced out.

“So what are you laughing at then?”

Having no good response, Harry answered, in a flat voice, “I don’t know, sir.”

“Ten more points, and get the hell out of my class,” Applewhite spat. He pointed towards the classroom door. “You can come back when that attitude’s adjusted.”

“But sir," "Hang on, Professor!” Hermione and Ron started at the same time. Then Hermione continued, after a pleading glance at Ron to stifle his temper, “please, Professor Applewhite, Harry really was just having a bit of fun. He didn’t mean anything by it.”

Applewhite looked for the barest moment like he was considering and taking Hermione’s words to heart, but then he turned back to Harry and glared. “Kid, I’ve seen you walk into this classroom for the last few weeks like you don’t have anything left to learn. At first I was gonna let it slide ‘cause I know who you are and what you’ve done and all that shit, but I’ve had enough of the sly looks between you and your little buddies, and the comments under your breath, and the lack of respect for not only me, but this entire class.”

Every word felt like a dagger in Harry’s chest because not a single, bloody bit of it was true. Anger suffused him then, a visceral defensive reaction to the professor’s aggressive inaccuracy, and his hands curled into fists down at his sides. “With all due respect, sir,” Harry spat back, his words clipped and pointed in their fury, “you very clearly don’t know a thing about me.”

Someone in the small crowd of students gasped, startling Harry a little and reminding him that he had a bigger audience than perhaps should have played witness to his rising temper. He took a breath in and out and uncurled his hands, trying to calm down despite the fact that he honestly felt ready to burst with how unfair it all was.

Applewhite shook his head. “Ten more points from Gryffindor, and if you don’t leave this classroom right now, I’m gonna make it fifty,” he said, before turning to face the rest of the gathered class. “Back to work, let’s go!”

Harry’s ears were ringing, so he heard nothing Hermione and Ron were saying as they quickly escorted him from the classroom. He was distantly aware that they were probably going to pay for that little act of insubordination as soon as Applewhite noticed they’d also left. Through the haze of his anger, though, a bright spot of yellow caught his eye and he lifted his head to chase it.

“All right there, Potter?” Malfoy called from his perch on the staircase that led down to Hufflepuff quarters. He got to his feet and leaned against the wall in an empty space between two paintings.

Despite his noticing the insufferable git and his insufferable hoodie, Harry found he was in absolutely no mood to play.

“Piss off, Malfoy,” Ron replied for him. He hooked an arm around Harry’s shoulders and started them off in the other direction, with Hermione trailing just behind.

“Just trying to be nice here, Weaselbee,” Malfoy drawled, “maybe you should try it some time.”

“What was that?” Ron whirled around and, having forgotten to let go of Harry’s shoulders, pulled Harry with him. “What was that you just said?”

“Leave it, Ron, it’s not worth it,” Hermione tried, getting in front and placing a hand on Ron’s chest to hold him back.

He puffed his chest out in response and strode forward anyway, belatedly remembering to let go of Harry. “Go on, Malfoy, let’s hear it. Let’s hear what you just fucking said,” he ranted. “Haven’t got all day, but now you’ve got our attention, so let’s go. Let’s hear what you just said!”

Hermione stepped in front of him again, putting herself between Ron and Malfoy. “Ronald, please. Malfoy didn’t actually do anything repulsive for once, so can we please just move along?” she asked, in a low, calm voice.

Snapping a bit out of his stupor at that, Harry stepped forward, ready to intervene in whatever fight was about to take place: Ron and Malfoy or Ron and Hermione.

But, not for the first time this year, Malfoy didn’t continue the aggression. He sagged a bit against the wall and brought his arms up to wrap defensively over his chest. “You two should listen to Granger more,” he said. “She’s clearly the only one with sense among you.”

“I...oh, well, thank you, Malfoy,” Hermione replied, obviously flustered by the genuine-seeming praise.

He flicked a glance at her and nodded shortly. He then opened his mouth to say something else, but was interrupted by the sudden arrival of one of his non-Slytherin friends.

“My scarf is still miss--oh! Hi Ron, Hermione, oh, and Harry!” said Susan Bones, as she appeared at the bottom of the stairs dressed as if she was about to go walking outside. She quickly jogged up them and joined Malfoy. As if by instinct, Malfoy quirked his elbow, and Susan slipped her arm into his, easy as you please.

“Take a photo, it’ll last longer, mate, for fuck’s sake,” Ron murmured in Harry’s ear.

Harry jerked his gaze up from Susan and Malfoy’s joined arms and returned Susan’s greeting with a nod and as much of a smile as he could manage.

“Aren’t you supposed to be in Defense?” she asked innocently, glancing among the three of them.

Harry opened his mouth to explain, but Hermione cut in before he could build to a rant again. “Had a bit of a run-in, but everything should be sorted before our next class,” she said vaguely. The story would likely be around the school in the next five minutes anyway, but Harry at least appreciated her effort.

“Ooh, rough going, yeah?” Susan replied brightly. “But I’m sure you’re right, everything will get sorted. I think we’re all sort of hoping for fresh starts and more peaceful days this year.” She glanced meaningfully at Malfoy then, but he only looked down at his feet.

“Right, of course,” Hermione replied, a question in her tone.

“Well, we were just going to have a bit of exercise out by the lake before dinner,” Susan continued, as if oblivious to the tension she was creating. “Would you want to join us?”

“No,” Malfoy put in shortly, before anyone else could reject the offer. “We’re not there yet. Let’s go.”

Their voices were just audible for Harry to make out that they were arguing quietly as they pushed past him and his friends and headed down the hallway.

“Okay, that’s really weird, right?” Ron asked.

They were halfway down the hall when Malfoy stopped suddenly and turned back around. His eyes were intent on Harry, almost as if he was willing Harry to call something back to him. And for the briefest, oddest moment, Harry almost felt as if he wanted to--did want to call Malfoy back, did want to ask him if Susan Bones was his girlfriend, if she gave him the hoodie, or if maybe he’d bought it as a gift for her, but then kept it himself because it was so comfortable. There were so many questions, not the least of which was: what is it that you want, really?

“Okay, that is _definitely_ weird.” Ron asserted.

But Harry just stared back at Malfoy until he turned back again, slung an arm around Susan’s waist this time, and continued on with her towards the front entrance to the grounds.

“Hush, Ron,” Hermione shushed him.

After a long moment, Harry turned back to them both and said quietly, “I’m starting to think that Halloween just really isn’t my holiday.”


	4. 20 Points, for Cheating

Harry sat propping his chin up with his hand at a table in the library and idly doodling in the margin of his homework on the use of valerian root in psychiatric medicinal potions, while he waited for Ron to return with the other book that they needed. He was also resolutely not staring at Malfoy and his friends, who just happened to be within his sightline. Yes, Ron had given him a look when Harry’d chosen the table in the first place, but it wasn’t Harry’s fault that this particular table held sentimental value (being the table where Hermione’d lugged out _Hogwarts, A History_ for the first of many times and pointed out the answer to a question that eventually helped them defeat Voldemort, again for the first of many times) and therefore was the only table he wanted to sit at while they did their homework.

“You’d think all the booky bits of this,” Ron said, as he plopped down in his seat and dropped a heavy tome between them, “would be easy after everything we’ve been through.”

“Actually I sort of think the opposite makes more sense,” Harry replied. “All that physical, practical stuff came easy because we were there in the moment and we had to make the right calls and go with our guts. This stuff?” He indicated the parchments and books all over the table. “Takes all that discipline that we were never all that good at before.”

Ron grinned at him. “Hermione’s rubbing off on you something fierce.”

Harry laughed and shrugged his shoulders. “Yeah,” he agreed, “maybe. Jealous?” He quirked his eyebrows cheekily.

Ron smirked at him and flipped him two fingers in response.

It was moments like these that made Harry feel the most at home--being able to sit around joking with his best friend. All the pain and the heartache and the fear of years prior seemed so very far off when he could look across the table at Ron, make a cheeky comment, and get a smile in return. He hadn’t even realized just how much he’d missed this sort of thing. They hadn’t had all that much time to do it, having almost constantly been under the weight of their destinies. It was simply another reminder of how much had been stolen from them all over the last few years, and how truly good it felt to be able to get some of it back.

Harry slid the book over to himself then and flipped through until he found the passage he needed and began to quietly read it. And if he had to re-read it a few times because across the way Malfoy’s arm had hooked itself around Wayne Hopkins’s neck, and Wayne Hopkins’s face had been tugged in close to Malfoy’s own so that they were murmuring all cozily to each other, well, nobody had to know about that.

“Mate, I’m starting to get very concerned about you.”

“What?” Harry asked, pulling his attention away from Malfoy and Hopkins immediately and looking first at Ron and then hurriedly back down at the book. “You know, honestly, these psychiatric potions are really fascinating...if I weren’t so dead-set on Auroring and so shit at actual Potions-making, it might be sort of cool to get into the medicinal field.”

“Nope, not letting you change the subject,” Ron replied. He scooted over a little closer and then, after glancing around, raised his wand and cast a quick _Muffliato_ so that they wouldn’t be overheard by the obviously intended subject of their conversation. “We’ve all been sort of tolerating your obvious Malfoy obsession”--Harry spluttered and made to cut him off, but Ron barrelled on--“but it’s seriously starting to get out of hand.”

“I haven’t been obsessing!”

Ron raised an eyebrow. “Fine, possibly not _obsessing_ in the traditional sense, but you’re definitely putting a hell of a lot more ‘observation time’ than seems strictly necessary if you’re just trying to figure out why the git’s made some different fashion choices this year,” he explained, before shooting a quick glance over at Malfoy’s table. Hopkins must have said something particularly witty because Malfoy had his forehead pressed against Hopkins’s shoulder and was shaking with laughter. “Fuck, mate!” Ron continued. “This is exactly what I’m bloody talking about!”

Flushing a little, Harry tore his gaze away from Malfoy (and his boyfriend possibly?) and offered a sheepish smile. “All right, fine,” he conceded, “I will admit that it’s possible I am being a little weird about this whole stupid Hufflepuff/Malfoy/hoodie conspiracy thing. It’s just…” He trailed off and looked away, more than a little embarrassed now. “I’m just wondering what it is they see in him,” he finished, in a small voice.

Because the thing was, the fact that not only was Malfoy no longer ostracized by most of the school, he was actively being welcomed and befriended by some of the very people that had no reason in the world to forgive him for what he’d done to them, either specifically or in general, had not escaped Harry’s notice, and it gave him serious pause. Because as much as he himself had, for general purposes, pardoned Malfoy, he hadn’t seen enough of a change to want to reach out and extend his own hand in friendship. He wasn’t sure he could ever totally forgive Malfoy for the role he had played in the deaths of so many of Harry’s friends and family. It wasn’t the sort of thing a person just _got past_. So Harry couldn’t necessarily wrap his mind around the fact that someone like Susan Bones, who had lost most of her family to Death Eaters, or someone like Wayne Hopkins, whose blood status had put him in serious danger of losing his life, could forgive and forget so easily.

Or rather, he was almost ashamed to admit, Harry wondered if it just meant that they were better people than he was. He wondered what it meant that he continued to struggle with his feelings about Slytherin in general and Malfoy in particular, despite his sincere belief in moving forward without a grudge.

“Oi, mate, look at me,” Ron said, and when Harry turned his head back, he looked pensive and serious in a way that made Harry almost unconsciously lean in a bit more. “I’m not going to pretend that I don’t have...what was it Hermione said? The emotional range of a teaspoon?”

Harry chuckled lightly, and Ron smiled wryly at him. “Yeah, that was it,” Harry said.

“Right, well, maybe I’m not particularly emotionally aware or what have you, but I do know that whatever it is you’re really worried about? You can get through it. You can, you know, you can figure your shit out, whatever it is, and we’re going to be here for you through it. No matter...no matter what it is, okay?”

It felt like Ron was trying to say something without actually saying it, and Harry, observant as he was normally, wasn’t sure what exactly that something was. All the same, though, he had to admit that Ron’s support warmed him inside. “Thanks,” he said. “For...for a lot of things, mate.”

Ron smiled and blushed to the tips of his ears. “Yeah, right back at you...now bloody hell, enough of this mushy stuff, I’ve got answers to fudge my way through.” He raised his wand and canceled the _Muffliato_ and the quiet sounds of the library filtered back in.

Harry nodded and pushed the book back so Ron could have a look over the passage needed. “They’re not that bad once you get going actually,” he said.

“Sure--you know this would be a whole hell of a lot easier if Hermione would just let us...you know,” he said, indicating their half-done questions. Hermione’s, of course, were complete and had been for days, but she had been steadfast in not letting either of them copy her work.

“But we won’t learn anything if we just keep leaning on her,” Harry replied, laughing a bit as he nudged his shoulder against Ron’s own. “Come on, I’ve only got one more to go, and you’ve only got--bloody hell, what have you been doing all this time? You’ve got ten left!”

“I was staring at Malfoy’s hoodie, obviously,” Ron answered dryly. “Oh no wait, that was you.”

“Shut up, wise-arse,” Harry said, shoving out at him again. “All right, go ahead, copy mine, but then you’re doing the last one on your own.”

“You’re a real gem,” he said, as he reached out and took Harry’s parchment to begin quickly copying the answers. “Just, you know, try not to stare at Malfoy the whole time.”

“Better hurry up then,” Harry joked back, and then put his elbows down on the table and stared exaggeratedly in Malfoy’s direction.

“You're a hopeless case, Harry,” Ron said.

Harry laughed at him and said, “I'm back on the idea that he bought it for his shag partner and then decided it was too warm and comfortable to give away.”

“There's about forty different things to unpack in that theory and I don't want to touch a single one of them. Also, your handwriting is shit, mate, what's this say?”

Harry turned back and bent his head over the parchment trying to figure out what he'd meant, when suddenly a shadow loomed over them both. He glanced back up, expecting maybe Hermione there to chastise them, but found to his extreme misfortune Madam Pince instead.

“Mr. Weasley!” Madam Pince glared down at them, her voice harsh even in its hushed, library-respectful volume. “I would expect this sort of behavior from First Years who don’t yet know better! Twenty points from Gryffindor for cheating!”

“Aww, bloody hell, miss,” Ron complained.

“And five more for language, Mr. Weasley! Now leave my library at once!”

Harry glared at the table while Ron packed up his belongings and brushed past Madam Pince.

“And as for you, Mr. Potter,” she continued, rounding on him again, “you may not have been the one doing the copying, but it's every bit the same that you'd allow Mr. Weasley to cheat from you. Twenty points from Gryffindor for you as well. I'm very disappointed in you.”

Harry apologized, and when she nodded her acceptance, he could have sworn that her expression was rueful, like she regretted having to discipline him. He scoffed a short laugh and then started gathering his things.

“Cheating, Potter, really?”

Harry flicked a glance up and glared at Malfoy, who'd obviously taken it upon himself to rub salt in the fresh wound. “Go away, Malfoy,” he said, but it lacked heat.

“For shame, Potter,” Malfoy said, with a devious gleam in his eye. He put his hands on the table then and leaned forward, lips curving up with the obvious delight he took in other people’s misery. “You’re supposed to at least _try_ not to get caught when you cheat. I’d thought future Aurors were supposed to be fantastic at stealth.”

“Get stuffed, Malfoy,” Harry snapped back.

Malfoy laughed brightly. “There’s that legendary wit!”

“Oh, piss off!” Harry spat, as he pushed himself up out of the chair and finished angrily shoving his things into his bag.

“Now, now,” Malfoy admonished, “no need to get shirty. I’m only trying to have a little fun.”

Harry rounded on Malfoy and was about to tell him the very creative thing he could do with that damn hoodie and his own bum, when he noticed the look on Malfoy’s face. Malfoy looked...nervous. He looked like possibly he had just been trying to tease, really tease the way that Harry teased and joked and took the piss with his friends, and was hopeful that Harry would take the comments as intended. And he considered his earlier thoughts for a moment, the question of what Malfoy’s new Hufflepuff friends saw in him.

“Sorry,” Harry then said. “I’m just annoyed. It was dumb of us to be so obvious, and I’m really tired of losing points.”

Malfoy gaped at him, looking taken aback by Harry’s honesty. But then he smiled, a tentative little thing that disappeared as quickly as it had come and returned to the more normal smirk that Harry was accustomed to from him. “One would think that you were used to losing House points what with all the trouble you’ve always caused,” he said.

It was playfully spoken; to his surprise, Harry could hear the difference. “That’s me,” he replied. “Always looking for trouble.”

“Always finding it, more like.”

“Exactly,” Harry said softly.

Malfoy nodded and then turned around to walk back to his table. He sat down at Hopkins’s side and, with one last look at Harry, he returned to his work, his lips curved up in a smile.

Harry watched him for a moment more and then left the library with a smile of his own on his face.


	5. 50 Points, for Being Out of Bounds

Harry absolutely was not drunk--no matter what anyone tried to say. He was decidedly not so far into his cups that literally everything that happened to or near him was hilarious, even including when Ron tripped over his overlarge feet and spilled almost an entire bottle of firewhisky into the carpet, soaking it and Harry’s socks in moments.

“Oh, whisky no!” Harry cried through his laughter, reaching with grabby hands down to the carpet. And when it became clear that he couldn’t just pull the spilled whisky out of the fibers, he clumsily removed his socks and tossed them in the general direction of his laundry basket. Their grave conundrum became clearer then, as the cool air hit his wet feet. “Ron,” he said seriously, “that was-- that was our last one.”

“Bloody hell, Ron, you’re the worst!” Neville chimed in, staring mournfully at the soaked carpet.

“The total worst,” Dean murmured, as he slumped forward and tried to reach for his wand that had rolled away out of reach. Seamus, who for an Irishman apparently had precious little tolerance for Ogden’s Old, gave a hearty snore at that and rolled over to burrow more intensely into Dean’s lap.

It was sweet, seeing them all cuddled up together. Dean and Seamus were just really, really sweet together. It was sweet that they were a couple and that, well, that now they didn’t feel like they needed to hide or anything. It was just really, well, it was nice. It was nice that they could cuddle--

“--we’re not a couple!”

Harry blinked at Dean. “Have you got the Inner Eye?” he asked, as he scanned all over Dean’s face for signs of the Sight. Not that, well, he could actually see them because he didn’t have the Sight himself, but there had to be something...

“No, dingus, you were talking _out loud_ ,” Ron teased. He came up behind Harry and gave him a soft whack upside the back of his head. “You’re rat-arsed.”

“Am not. Not even at all,” Harry insisted. “You--you are the one who's--who's rat-arsed. You totally are, you're bloody-- _pissed_ is what you are.”

“Wrong-o,” Ron sang-songed. “I can hold my drink. I can hold it very well, thank you.”

“‘Cept when you drop it!” Neville put in and then burst into laughter.

Harry joined him, laughing so hard his sides started to hurt, and then he groaned because Neville had reminded him that Ron, the oaf, had dropped the bottle and left them with nothing more to drink. And honestly what was a small gathering of friends celebrating the winter hols together on the last night before they were all set to return home for two weeks without a bit of spirits? It was right there in the name, wasn’t it? Didn’t people always ask ‘oi, where’s your holiday spirit?’ “Ron, you ruined it. You ruined Christmas. It’s all your fault, you totally ruined it!” Harry accused, pointing a finger at his friend.

“Bugger off, mate, I did not. We just need to go get some more, s’all,” he replied matter-of-factly.

“We’re not a couple though, Harry. I’m dating Ginny remember?” said Dean, apparently all hung up on that and not really listening to the predicament they were in. “I mean...oh bugger it, I’m not supposed to-- Ron said I wasn’t supposed to talk about it anymore because it’s his sister and it gives him palpitations.” Dean moved like he was going to try to get out of the bed, only he remembered that Seamus was passed out on top of him. Dean shoved out at Seamus then until Seamus rolled off his lap and nearly off the bed before Dean caught him at the last moment. Dean had fantastic reflexes, blimey. He should have been a Seeker. He’d have been a great Seeker actually. Why didn’t Dean play Quidditch?

“Account of you’re the Seeker, mate, seriously,” Ron said.

“Am I thinking out loud again?” Harry asked.

“So are, Harry,” answered Neville. “But you know, you know, Harry’s right, Dean, you’d make a hell of a Seeker. Bet you and Gin get up to some great Seeker’s games. Find the Snitch and whatnot--ow, bloody hell, Ron!”

Harry burst out laughing again, as Ron had thumped Neville good up the backside of his head. Ron really was effective with that move. He should put it in his arsenal for when they were Aurors and had to catch criminals and Dark wizards. It’d be perfect. And so would Dean and Seamus if Dean and Seamus were actually a Dean and Seamus couple. “Dean!” Harry then said. “Dean, though, seriously, you know it’d be okay if you were right?”

Dean cocked his head and then grinned. “Yeah, Harry, ‘course. It’d be great. It’d be great and it’d be all sweet and whatnot,” he said.

“Okay good, just so you know, okay?”

“Okay, Harry.” But it was Ron who said it, not Dean, but that was fine. Ron had said it was fine too, and that was really fantastic.

“All right!” Neville then said, pushing himself up from his spot on the bed leaned out toward the middle of the floor. “Now that we’re all settled on how that’s great and we’re fine, who’s going to go get the drinks? ‘Cause we’re here to celebrate, yeah? So someone has to go.”

“Go where though?” called Dean.

“To the kitchens!”

“Ugh, that’s so far away,” Dean groaned.

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it, it’s totally fine, I’ll go,” said Harry. “I’m going to just go to the kitchens and I’m going to get us some more. The house-elves’ll help. They like me.” He stood up, wobbling only slightly because he seriously wasn’t even that pissed at all, actually, and started towards the bedroom door. “One of the house-elves’ll help us.”

“Harry, wait!” Ron called, before flopping backwards onto Harry’s bed and draping a hand over his eyes. “You should see if maybe you can get some pasta or something too. We need some food.”

“Fuck, Ron, you have the best ideas. You have seriously the best ideas,” Dean said, pointing across the room. “Harry, yes, definitely. Bring us the pasta. All the pasta you can get. Yes. Best. Best idea of all.”

“Whisky and pasta, yes, I can totally do this, don’t even worry, you lot. I’ve got it, you can count on me,” Harry said. He gave them a jaunty salute and then crept out their bedroom door and down the stairs to the common room.

The trek to the kitchens was made easily enough, too, because Harry was absolutely fine and not nearly drunk enough to make a commotion, and everything was going to be just fine, and soon, they’d have more whisky and they’d have pasta to eat, and it would be the best celebration of...of, fuck it all, what were they celebrating again? “Christmas!”

“Shhhh! Fuck, who’s there?”

Harry whirled around, ready to cast a hex at whoever was there sneaking up on him, except he’d sort of forgot his wand back in his bedroom, but that was okay because he was very powerful and could totally do this wandless if needs must.

“Potter?”

“Malfoy!”

“Shhhh, bloody hell, Potter, quit screaming.”

“‘M’not _screaming_ , Malfoy, Christ,” Harry said witheringly. Malfoy was standing awfully close though, wasn’t he? Well, sure, maybe he just thought Harry was screaming because he was standing so close. No need to get angry.

“I’m not angry at you, I just want you to shut your bloody hole, Potter, _Merlin_. You’re going to get us all caught!” Malfoy hissed.

“Sorry, sorry, I keep thinking out loud,” Harry offered, a wide grin stretching his face. “But don’t worry, Malfoy, we’re not going to get caught. And if we are, don’t worry about it because the house-elves will help us. They’re really great when you treat them the way they deserve. You know, I mean, _you don’t know_ , but I can show you, and it’ll be fine.”

Malfoy didn’t respond to that, and his expression shuttered.

“Oh, oh no, oh what, no, Malfoy!” Harry cried, reaching out to grab him by the shoulders. “What’s wrong? Why are you, why’s your face doing that? No, stop. Everything is fine, just like I said. I said it’s going to be fine and the house-elves are going to help us. So smile again. You look so much better when you smile.”

“Good grief, Potter,” came another voice from the shadows.

Harry whirled around again, stumbled back a bit into Malfoy’s thankfully waiting arms, and then carefully righted himself. Fuck, it was dizzy out here, wasn’t it?

“Well, you’re shnookered, aren’t you?” asked Zabini.

“What? Psh, no, you’re seeing things, Zabini. I’m fine. I’m so very--well, okay, yeah a bit maybe. We were,” Harry laughed, “we were having a party because of…”

“...Christmas?” Malfoy supplied.

Harry turned back to him with a wide grin. “Yes! Christmas. We were totally celebrating about Christmas.”

“So were we, but fucking hell, Potter, you have got to be quieter! Someone is going to come out here and catch us,” Malfoy insisted. His eyes were wide and darting back and forth, pupils blown in, well, kind of a sexy way, actually.

“Relax, Draco,” said Zabini, striding forward now to join them. “Don't mind him, Potter, Draco always gets a bit paranoid when he's been smoking mallow.”

“Blaise!”

“You smoke mallowsweet?” Harry asked.

“Only on special occasions,” Zabini answered for him. “Or when Hopkins feels like being generous.”

“Ugh, Hopkins, right,” Harry said, frowning gently. “Hey Malfoy, is Hopkins the one who gave you the thing?” Malfoy’s eyes widened, and Zabini laughed so hard he actually fell back against the wall again to support himself. “You know, the thing, the shirt. Is it because...are you two...Malfoy, I’m trying to ask you a thing, it’s very important!”

“Go on, Draco, answer the poor man. He’s dying to know,” Zabini said, teasing.

But before Malfoy could answer: “Why the hell am I not surprised to find you out here right now?”

“Oh bugger.” Harry took a step in front of Malfoy and held his arm out in front of Malfoy’s chest. “Don’t worry, it’s okay. It’s going to be okay,” he insisted.

Professor Applewhite appeared as if out of nowhere, and maybe he was like Dumbledore had been and could go invisible without a cloak, or wait, no, he was also an Auror, so he had lots of cloaking and masking spells probably in his arsenal for like stakeouts and things and he was probably just standing there in the hall the whole time and oh no what had he heard already?

“Fuck’s sake, Potter, pull yourself together,” Zabini muttered, “or we’re in worse trouble.”

“Pipe down, kid,” Applewhite said, dismissively.

His stare remained focused on Harry, and Harry did his best to keep his mouth shut, even though all he wanted to do was explain their way out of this because Malfoy looked ready to faint, and Harry couldn’t have that happening. Malfoy needed protecting. They both did, Malfoy and Zabini both needed protecting because Harry was pretty sure that Zabini was on some kind of probation, and he knew for a fact that Malfoy was, and if anybody found out that they were stoned, they were going to be in pretty serious trouble, and oh shit--shit--bloody buggering fuck was he thinking out loud again?

“Professor, we’re sorry,” Zabini then said, standing up a little straighter. “Slughorn had given us permission to have a little holiday going-away party in Slytherin, and we ran out of snacks, so we’d come down to see if we couldn’t get something from the kitchens. We didn’t realize how late it was. We’re quite sorry, honest.”

“Oh, okay good,” Harry said.

“What’s good?” Applewhite asked.

“I wasn’t saying all that stuff out loud.”

“What stuff?”

“Potter might have had a bit too much to drink, Professor,” Zabini interrupted before Harry could respond again. “But might I remind that we’re all of age, so he’s not technically done anything wrong?”

Applewhite’s eyes narrowed, and Harry held his breath. Zabini was a real fucking arse, but he wasn’t wrong, and maybe everything was going to be okay? Maybe they were going to talk their way out of this mess, and honestly, Harry would have to thank Zabini some day because Applewhite totally hated him already and catching him out of bounds after curfew was a sure-fire way to get even further in--

“--damn it, Potter, what’s wrong with you?” Zabini groaned.

“He’s a hot mess, is what’s wrong with him,” Applewhite answered for him.

Harry wrinkled his nose, but then threw his hands up in a surrendering gesture. “Yeah, yeah, all right, you’ve got me, bloody hell,” he admitted. If it was going to save Zabini and Malfoy, then Harry would gladly take the hit. Because they needed him, and he was always going to be there to help people who needed help.

Applewhite scrubbed a hand over his face, sighing angrily. “Y’all are gonna be the death of me, I swear. All right,” he turned and pointed at Zabini and Malfoy in turn, “fifty points each from Slytherin for being out after curfew. And as for you,” he turned and glared at Harry, “fifty points from Gryffindor for the same, and a detention to be served with me when you get back from Christmas break.”

“Aw, come on, that’s unfair, sir!” Harry complained.

“Sir, why does Potter get punished more than us?” Malfoy asked.

Harry turned and stared at him, eyes wide and concerned. “No, shhhh, Malfoy, it’s fine. I’m fine. It’s fine, I’ll do my detention, don’t worry about me.”

“Because for some reason known only to this little punk, he thinks it’s cool to be drunk and roaming around this campus like his goddamn shit don’t stink,” Applewhite replied angrily. “Now get the hell out of my sight, all three of you. Back to your dorms. Party’s over.”

“Go on back, Draco. I’ll see this one back to his dorm,” Zabini offered, which was actually really very nice of him to do. “Ha, yes, well, you’re welcome, Potter.”

“Oh, ha, yeah, I...well, yeah, thanks. Thank you, Zabini. Night, Malfoy!” Harry called behind him, as Zabini took him by the elbow and started them off in the direction of Gryffindor. He didn’t hear if Malfoy replied, but Harry was pretty sure he was smiling. Malfoy really did have kind of a lovely smile when it wasn’t all cruel and sneer-ish.

“I’ll tell him you think so,” Zabini said.

“Fuck, I need to shut up,” Harry replied, cheeks flushing.

“Great idea, you do that.”

They walked on in silence for a bit, at least Harry thought so, until a thought popped into his head that he absolutely had to share with Zabini, if only for validation. “You know what’s weird though? Applewhite curses a lot, doesn’t he? I mean like for a professor.”

Zabini laughed like it was punched out of him, and Harry grinned. “You’re actually--fuck, can’t believe I’m saying this--you’re not so bad, Potter,” Zabini then said. “I can see why he…”

Harry waited a moment for Zabini to go on, but he just fell silent and shook his head. “See why who what?” Harry asked.

“Never mind. Come on, Potter, let’s just get you back to your bed,” Zabini answered.

“Yeah, all right,” Harry replied. “My bed is pretty great.”

Zabini smirked. “I’m sure it is.”


	6. 25 Points, for Abandoning Detention

Harry’s wrist was starting to ache something fierce, even though he was only on line twenty-five of the two-hundred he was supposed to copy for detention with Applewhite. As punishments went, it wasn’t the most creative Harry’d experienced during his years at Hogwarts, but then, he was starting to get the idea that Applewhite wasn’t exactly as well-versed in the administrative bits of being part of the Hogwarts teaching staff as he should possibly have been. According to Hermione, Applewhite was responsible for the most points deductions by a single teacher in a single term in the last fifteen years (a fact she’d picked up from no less a credible source than Headmistress McGongall herself), and if he kept it up at the rate he was going, he’d take away more points this year than all the other professors combined.

“Must do things really differently over in America,” Harry muttered to himself, as he sat back and massaged his right wrist for a moment.

“What wazzat?”

Harry turned and glanced at his detention partner for the evening, Morag MacDougal. “Oh, sorry, I was just”--he shot a quick glance up at the front of the room to be sure Applewhite was still in his office, then lowered his voice--“thinking about how shit he is at the Points system thing.”

“Merlin, I know!” MacDougal replied. They snuck a glance to the front of the room as well before turning back to Harry and adding, conspiratorially, “I was rootin’ for ‘im so ‘ard because ‘e’s on my team, ya know? But bloody hell, ‘e’s so quick to take points away and so many for like the stupidest things! So frustratin’.”

“Yeah, exactly! It’s the _amount_ , I think, that’s so weird,” Harry added, warming to his theme and grateful to find someone beyond his group of friends to vent to. “Especially because you have to have noticed that all the other professors and staff have been pretty seriously lenient so far this year.”

MacDougal pointed a finger at him and nodded, agreeing. “Oh, aye, absolutely. I mean, I totally let me temper get the best of me and hexed the hell out of this arsehole who made a shit comment about me girlfriend’s weight, and I was fully expectin’ more punishment than just a loss of five points from Flitwick, but,” they shrugged, grinning, “‘at was all she wrote, an’ I was grateful as fook.”

Harry grinned at them, then asked, “So what are you in for today then?”

MacDougal laughed and answered, “Same fookin’ tosser asked us for a threesome and I socked ‘im one across the jaw. Applewhite saw everythin’.”

Harry’s grin fell off his face at that. “Right, and I bet the other bloke didn’t get punished at all even though he bloody well started it,” he said angrily.

“No, no,” MacDougal replied, “‘e did. Lost I think it was fifteen points for lewdness or summat.”

“Oh, okay. Well that’s good at least,” Harry said. He hadn’t been all that lucky so far yet. Or, well, Zabini and Malfoy had both lost excessive points for the Christmas incident, he supposed. But still, while Applewhite might not have been playing favorites, he was still being frightfully unfair in many ways.

MacDougal shrugged again and then, with one last smile, returned to their work. Harry followed suit, eager to be done so that he could get on with his night, but happy to have found yet another person on his side. Malfoy wasn’t the only one, then, who could branch out beyond his House and befriend someone.

It wasn’t, of course, like Harry disliked the other Houses on principle or anything, nor did he dislike people from different Houses specifically. It was just that with the exceptions of Dumbledore’s Army, which hadn’t even been school-sanctioned, and Quidditch, which encouraged rivalry rather than unity, there hadn’t been many opportunities to spend extended periods of time with the rest of his yearmates. The House system was what it was, and it worked in some ways certainly, but at the end of the day, it promoted differences and kept people separate. Harry had never really got to know many people outside Gryffindor all that well. It was nice, then, to be able to do it now.

“Draco, are you ever going to give that thing back to me?”

The words were almost like a shot of adrenaline, pulling Harry from the stupor he’d fallen into copying lines again. He glanced toward the classroom door just in time to see Malfoy slip past, the bright yellow of the hoodie making him easily recognizable despite only catching a glimpse.

“You can pry it from my cold, dead hands,” he responded to his companion, presumably the still-unknown Hufflepuff hoodie owner.

“Oh, bloody hell,” Harry said, glancing up at the clock at the front of the classroom, which showed than nearly an hour had passed, and then down at Applewhite’s desk, which remained empty.

The thing was, Harry knew without a doubt, that this was a set-up. It was a late Tuesday evening, which meant that Malfoy should have been all sprawled out in front of the fire in the Slytherin common room with Parkinson, Zabini, and Nott, and with the increasingly likely additions of Susan Bones, Wayne Hopkins, and assorted other Hufflepuffs, doing the same kind of things that Harry and his friends did in the Gryffindor common room. Harry knew this because, well, in the weeks before the Christmas holidays, he might possibly have caught Susan after class one afternoon and _politely_ questioned her about her relationship with Malfoy. She'd been full of all manner of useful information, and he'd walked away from the conversation much more confident about his investigation into the mysterious Hufflepuff hoodie. Then, unfortunately, it had required back-burnering again with the onslaught of coursework and NEWTs preparation as everyone prepared to return home for the end of fall term.

(There was also the unfortunate incident of the night before they left, which Harry might have chalked up to a drunken hallucination or something if it weren't for the fact that he was serving detention right now for his role in it.)

But, yes, Malfoy should have been holed up with his friends instead of strategically walking past Applewhite’s classroom, talking about the very thing Harry was still endlessly curious about. It was a classic trap that Malfoy had laid, and Harry kind of hated himself at the moment because he was going to fall right into it. He consoled himself with the thought that since he _knew_ it was a trap, it didn’t count as being tricked, as he glanced up at the front of the classroom to ensure that Applewhite was still in his office and then quickly and quietly got up from his desk and hurried to the classroom door.

It was only going to take a second, of course, to see who Malfoy was talking to (because it wasn’t Susan Bones or Wayne Hopkins--Harry knew their voices very well now) and therefore discover the hoodie’s original owner, and then Harry would be satisfied and wouldn’t have to worry about it any longer. Or, well, not that he was worried--more that he was interested, and once he had his answer, the question would no longer be interesting.

“ _Bloody hell, Potter, just hurry up already_ ,” Harry said aloud to himself.

“Oh, Merlin, no, ‘Arry, don’ do it,” MacDougal whisper-urged. “Applewhite is absolutely, one-’undred percent goin’ to catch ya.”

“I’ll just...I’ll just be a second. I’m just going to look, and I’ll be right back, and he won’t even notice I’ve moved,” Harry responded.

“Yer funeral, mate,” MacDougal said, then flicked a hand toward the door. “Well go on, then, ‘urry up!”

Harry nodded and then, after one more glance to make sure Applewhite wasn’t coming out of his office, darted to the classroom door and looked down the hallway. Malfoy and whomever he’d been talking to were gone, and Harry let out a frustrated noise. Then, making a choice he knew he was probably going to regret later, he turned back around, called to MacDougal, “Cover for me, please?” and slipped out into the hall to run down in the direction Malfoy’d been going.

It didn’t take him long to catch up because when he rounded the corner, he found Malfoy leaning against the wall, arms folded casually over his chest, and an amused expression on his face. He was, of fucking course, alone and, after Harry had glanced this way and that to see where his friend or boyfriend or girlfriend or whoever it had been had gone, Harry turned back to see that Malfoy’s smile had grown so sly that Harry was hardly aware how he could keep his face like that without collapsing under the weight of his own smugness.

With a weary sigh, Harry asked, “Are you having fun at least?”

“What do you mean?” Malfoy replied, all faux-innocence.

“Fucking with me like this. Are you having fun? Is my ridiculousness bringing you joy?”

Something almost like disappointment that Harry couldn’t quite identify flitted across Malfoy’s face before he answered, maddeningly innocent again, “I haven’t the faintest what you’re talking about, Potter. I’m just standing here waiting for a friend.”

“Right,” Harry said, shaking his head. “Right, of course you are.”

“But, well, now that I’ve got your attention, Potter,” Malfoy said, his tone less teasing now, “there is something I’d wanted to say.”

“I’m listening,” Harry replied, a little wary.

“It’s about, well…” Malfoy trailed off, and he looked nervous, which completely threw Harry for a loop.

“Er, just, you know, it’s all right,” Harry offered. He honestly had no idea where Malfoy was going with this, with the exception of being certain it had nothing to do with their stupid little game, such as it was.

“I’ve sort of been trying to say it for a bit now, but I’ve never quite known what or...or how to say it exactly. This isn’t”--Malfoy let out a short, self-deprecating laugh--“exactly my area normally.”

Harry sighed gently and let his hands fall to his sides, opening his chest and relaxing his demeanor as much as he could. He could be open, whatever it was Malfoy wanted to say. “I’m listening,” he repeated, more gently.

“All right. I,” Malfoy began, taking a step forward, “that is, I wanted to th--”

“Pretty sure I’m out of patience now.”

“Ahhhhh, fuck,” Harry groaned, his chin dropping to his chest in defeat. Applewhite had quite possibly the worst timing in the world...or maybe Harry himself did, honestly.

“All right, kid,” Applewhite continued, “now I'm starting to think that you’ve got about as much sense as lump on a log.” Thankfully, he only sounded tired to Harry’s ears, rather than angry, and when he turned around to face the music, Applewhite’s expression was indeed more exhausted-looking than anything else. “What the hell are you doing?”

“I was just--” Harry began, but Applewhite held up a hand to stop him.

“Nah, forget it, you know what? I really don’t actually want to hear it. Just, seriously get your ass back to detention and finish up your lines. And that’s twenty-five points from Gryffindor for thinking you can just walk out your detention whenever you feel like it. Although,” Applewhite paused and gave Harry an assessing look up and down, “I’m starting to think that you don’t actually give a fuck about House points. It’s not even a goddamn deterrent. You really don’t care if you totally blow it for your Housemates, do you?”

Trying desperately to hold onto his temper so as to avoid another mad escalation of the situation like a few months ago in Applewhite’s classroom, Harry very deliberately kept his expression neutral and his voice even as he responded, simply, “I’m sorry, Professor. I don’t mean to be insubordinate, and I do care about my Housemates. I’ll do better.”

Applewhite looked taken aback at that and, when Harry snuck a glance at him, Malfoy looked impressed before carefully hiding it behind careful, deliberate blankness. “Apology accepted,” Applewhite then replied gruffly. “Now go on, get back to it.”

“Yes, sir,” Harry said solemnly.

He consoled himself with the fact that when he glanced over his shoulder on his way back to the classroom, Malfoy looked genuinely sorry before he turned around and walked off after whomever he’d been walking with before. And then, a few minutes later, when a paper crane flew in through the classroom door and landed on Harry’s parchment, Harry really consoled himself with the message contained within: _I feel like that one was my fault. I’ll try to make it up to you. -- DM._


	7. 15 Points, for Being Out of Uniform

“Oi, you lot, very bloody funny!” Harry shouted, as he peered around the edge of the shower curtain, but he received no answer except for the phantom sound of his friends laughing at him for his predicament. “Come on, come back!”

It was the oldest, stupidest, most childish trick in the book--taking a bloke’s clothes while he was in the shower. Admittedly, if he was on the other side of it, Harry probably would have been laughing too. Of course, he also would have probably brought whomever’s clothes back after a few minutes of letting them sweat because he wasn’t a complete monster. But as it was, he was alone in the bathroom and about fifteen minutes from being late to Advanced Potions.

He’d honestly have foregone bathing this morning after oversleeping if it weren’t for the fact that after last night’s grueling Quidditch practice he’d just poured his sweaty self into bed without even undressing, so exhausted was he. Harry was gentleman enough not to inflict the smell of post-Quidditch, post-sleep man on the rest of his classmates, no matter how much the instinct not to be late to class and possibly risk another set of lost points.

So he’d hurried to the showers, bringing his uniform robes and book-bag to the bathroom with him, with the intent to clean up as quickly as possible and then run to class as quickly as if he’d Apparated. But now here he was, naked and dripping and his clothing was nowhere to be found. Whoever had taken his robes had at least been kind enough to leave his book-bag behind, and so Harry wrapped himself in a towel, picked his bag up, and darted out of the bathroom towards the bedrooms again.

“Looking good, Harry!” Ginny cat-called, as he passed her coming out of her own bedroom.

“Shut up, Gin!” he hissed back at her, before darting inside his dorm and shutting the door on her cackling laughter. “All right, robes, robes, where the fuck are my fucking robes?” He dug through his trunk, but failed to find a single set of uniform robes. It was then that Harry remembered that it was laundry day, which meant the robes he’d brought with him to the bathrooms were the only set he had right now, since everything else was with the laundry service house-elves.

Letting out a frustrated growl, Harry looked at his watch, which told him that if he didn’t get dressed and leave right now, he was absolutely going to be late for class. So, with only a moment of reluctance, Harry dug out a pair of jeans and a Weasley jumper, threw them on, and then raced out of the bedroom, down the stairs, and out the common room entrance. He practically flew through the halls, sending up a silent prayer to whoever was listening that there were no teachers about to take points away from him, and managed to make it to Potions a bare thirty seconds before Professor Slughorn came in and sat down at his desk in front of the class.

“Cutting it awfully close there, Harry, goodness!” Hermione said, as Harry tried to catch his breath.

“Yeah, well,” he panted, “someone sodding stole my robes, and then I didn’t have any others clean, so I’m bloody lucky I’m here at all, yeah?”

Ron snickered on Hermione’s other side, and Harry leveled a glare at him. “What, mate, it wasn’t me!” he insisted, hands raised placatingly.

“Ronald, honestly, how incredibly childish,” Hermione whispered. The slight upward curve of her lips, however, betrayed her amusement.

Harry vowed to get back at both of them at the earliest possible opportunity, but before he could begin plotting his revenge, Professor Slughorn called on the class to settle down so that he could begin the lesson.

“Good morning, good morning all, let us begin today with our--”

“--pardon me, Professor, terribly sorry,” said Malfoy, as he burst in through the classroom door. “Got a bit caught up.”

He was wearing the hoodie because of sodding course he was. Malfoy had it on over his robes and looked patently ridiculous, but he clearly didn’t seem to care about his appearance anymore if he was bringing this sort of escalation to the table.

“To your seat quickly, Mr. Malfoy, and five from Slytherin for tardiness!”

“Of course sir, very sorry,” Malfoy replied genuinely, and with a suspiciously straight face.

“Harry,” Hermione whispered, tugging on his sleeve, “close your mouth, love.”

Rather than dignify that with a response, Harry just slumped forward over the desk with a groan. “I’m still sleeping, aren’t I?” he mumbled, the words muffled by his arms.

“Not quite, mate,” Ron answered him. “And sit up, Sluggy’s looking over here.”

Harry did as requested, but turned his head and watched as Malfoy sat down in his seat next to Nott. Double Advanced Potions was almost dismally small in class size, with Malfoy, Nott, Zabini, and three Seventh Years Harry didn’t know being the only Slytherins. Ron, Hermione, and Harry himself with six Seventh Years were the Gryffindor representation. Which also, unfortunately, meant that there really wasn’t anywhere for Harry to hide.

“Mr. Potter, goodness, what on earth are you wearing? Where is your uniform?”

Harry grimaced as he looked up at the professor. “Awfully sorry, sir,” he answered, “but I don’t have it. Laundry day, you know?”

Slughorn frowned and shook his head. “One must be better prepared, Mr. Potter. I’m afraid that’ll have to be fifteen points from Gryffindor.”

Harry’s mouth dropped open, dumbfounded, as Hermione and Ron exchanged glances at his side. “But, sir, I-- Malfoy’s literally sitting there in Muggle clothes as well--oh bloody hell!” he groaned at himself, cringing at the way the words poured out of his mouth, all childish and petulant and quite against his will. He’d meant calmly to explain why he wasn’t in his school robes and to assure Slughorn that he’d be back in them shortly. Merlin, what was _wrong_ with him lately? Malfoy’s stupid hoodie seemed to bring out simultaneously the best and worst in Harry, and it was becoming a genuine problem.

Slughorn chuckled slightly, as he glanced over at Malfoy and gave a short nod, before returning his attention to Harry. “Mr. Malfoy is expressing his school spirit and a commitment to House unity for which he should be commended. Five points to Slytherin, in fact!”

“Oh no.”

“Aw, bugger it, here we go.”

Harry ignored them both and just said nothing because he was now absolutely certain that he was still asleep and that he was going to wake up any moment. Because he had obviously officially entered some sort of upside down nightmare realm. There was no chance at all that this was really, actually happening.

“No, yeah, actually, er, it is happening, mate,” Ron said.

Harry took a breath, held it for the count of five, exhaled slowly, and then said, “All right then. That’s fine. That is just fine. Everything is fine.” He affixed a smile to his face and then addressed Professor Slughorn again. “Oh sir? Would it be possible to get those points back if I switch this jumper out for, say, a Ravenclaw one? I’m quite a fan of those bronze eagles.”

“Oh, Harry no,” Hermione murmured at his side.

But if Slughorn even heard the sarcasm at all, he chose not to address it. “That would be rather nice, Mr. Potter, I should say! In fact, this goes for all of my students, please feel that my classroom is a safe space for you to express your commitment to the unification of the Houses and your love of our fair Hogwarts. Excellent idea, Mr. Potter! Very admirable indeed! All right then, with that business out of the way, let us return to our discussion of alchemy. Who remembers where we left off last class?”

The rest of the lesson passed by quickly, and Harry spent most of it staring at Malfoy who Harry was absolutely certain had noticed, but was frustratingly not acknowledging it. And when class was dismissed, Harry didn’t even bother to wait for Ron and Hermione whom he knew would only discourage him, and bounded over to Malfoy’s desk. He placed his hands on it and leaned over, looming a bit into Malfoy’s space.

“Hello, Potter, you’re looking poor,” Malfoy said, with a smirk. Harry glanced down at his Weasley jumper and was about to make a very nasty retort when Malfoy, to his utter shock, cringed and quickly continued, “I meant ‘poor’ as opposed to ‘well,’ not that...you know, it wasn’t meant to be a comment about Weasley.”

“I...oh, er...huh,” Harry said.

“Very eloquent,” Malfoy replied, recovering more quickly than Harry had.

“Right…” Harry said, brow furrowed in confusion. “So, er, you...you’re,”--he gestured to Malfoy’s hoodie--“still keeping up the charade, hm?”

“Charade?” Malfoy asked, in an over-exaggeratedly scandalized voice. “I’m merely expressing my commitment to House unity, Potter. It’s admirable, remember?”

Harry scoffed, unable to help himself. “Come off it. We both know why you’re doing this.”

“No, actually, I’m quite sure only one of us knows that, Potter,” Malfoy replied, smirking.

“A commitment to House unity,” Harry dead-panned.

“Exactly.” Malfoy grinned at him. “Did you want to borrow it for next time you want to go gallivanting ‘round the school without proper robes on?”

Harry’s eyes widened, as he gaped at Malfoy. He had the sudden, mad thought that Malfoy had somehow been the one to steal his robes out of Gryffindor Tower. “You--you...bloody buggering hell, you--”

“Cat got that tongue, Potter?” Malfoy asked, leaning up a bit more into Harry’s space now.

Annoyingly, Malfoy was close enough that looking him straight in the eye was making Harry feel even more myopic than usual, so he dropped his gaze down a bit and focused on Malfoy’s lips, watching the shapes they made as he continued to speak, no doubt saying all manner of rude nonsense.

“Good grief, get a sodding room, would you?”

Jerking back, Harry snapped his gaze in the direction of the voice. “What? Shut up!”

“Good one, Potter,” drawled Nott, with a roll of his eyes.

“Harry, please, let’s go. You should get changed so this doesn’t happen again next class,” Hermione said, coming up to his side, taking his arm, and trying to lead him away.

“Oh boo,” Malfoy said, “but we were having so much fun!”

“Literally no one is enjoying observing your duel, Draco,” Nott said.

“Oh, now there’s an idea!” Malfoy replied. “What do you say, Potter? Once and for all, for old time’s sake?”

“What?” Hermione interrupted. “What are you all talking about? Why are we dueling? No one is dueling!”

“Hang on, Granger,” Zabini said, “aren’t you exhausted with watching these two idiots go back and forth over literally nothing?”

“It’s not nothing,” Harry put in, even though, well, it sort of was really.

“Right, it’s absolutely something,” Malfoy said, in a low voice that traveled the entire length of Harry’s body for reasons he did not care to investigate at the moment.

“Oh ho, what’s all this then?” Slughorn’s voice suddenly carried across the room. He made his way over and placed a hand on Ron’s and Zabini’s shoulders. “We’re not stirring up trouble, are we?”

“No, sir, just having a chat,” Zabini said easily.

“And we were just leaving, sir,” Hermione added. “Weren’t we?” The last was directed fervently at Harry and Ron.

Slughorn beamed at them. “I will say I had my doubts about coming back this year, but seeing you all together like this? Well, it really does my heart good. Good on you, lads!”

“Right, yes, absolutely sir,” Harry replied. And after Slughorn had nodded and walked away, he raised an eyebrow in challenge and added, “So, are we dueling then or not?”

Malfoy looked taken aback briefly and then, for a moment so quick Harry didn’t think he’d have noticed if he hadn’t been watching Malfoy so carefully, relieved. He grinned--a genuine, excited grin--and said, “Name the time and place. Theo will be my second.”

“I will not,” Nott sighed.

“Blaise will be my second,” Malfoy continued, without missing a beat.

Zabini glanced up at the sound of his name, looked between the pair of them, and shrugged his shoulders. “Yeah, all right, might be a laugh,” he agreed, before returning to his examination of his cuticles.

“Ron’s my second,” Harry said.

Ron looked at Hermione, who narrowed her eyes and shook her head, and then turned back to grin at Harry. “Obviously, count me in.”

“You boys are the absolute worst, you know that?” Hermione said. She rolled her eyes and then turned and left the classroom in a huff, and it was such a strong reminder of his younger years that Harry couldn’t help but grin widely, despite the fact that he was still rather annoyed with literally everything that had happened today.

Ron, too, was staring off after Hermione, a slightly dazed expression on his face. “Bloody hell, mate, I’m going to marry that woman someday,” he said quietly.

“Yeah, you are,” Harry replied.

“ _Mazel tov_ , Weasley,” Nott said dryly, as he suddenly brushed past. “Draco, Blaise, I’ll be in the library until supper. Don’t forget Wayne’s bringing by the last of the...you know what for tonight. I’ll get the cocoa mix.”

“Right, yes, got it,” Zabini replied with a sharp nod.

“The last of the what?” Ron asked, suspicious gaze flicking back and forth between Malfoy and Zabini.

Zabini’s lips pursed into a smirk, but then he seemed to decide something after a short nod from Malfoy. “Come now, Weasley, don’t be a dunce. You know what Wayne Hopkins brings to every good party, don’t you?”

“I, oh. Fuck you, Zabini,” Ron said, the tips of his ears reddening with his embarrassment. “You don’t have to be a bastard about it.”

Zabini laughed. “Of course I do. But anyway, you’re welcome to join us if you like. Should be a fairly decent group.”

“I, well, er…yeah, all right, sounds good,” Ron said, sounding pleasantly surprised at both the offer and his own response to it.

“We can discuss the details of their duel as well,” Zabini then added, with another smirk.

Nodding, Ron replied, “Fine, yeah, count us in.”

“Fantastic, it’s a date then,” Malfoy said.

Harry looked at Malfoy then, also surprised, but Malfoy just flashed him a smile back.


	8. 250 Points, for Fighting

“I would just like to go on record right now,” Ginny said, “that you couldn’t possibly have picked a worse place to do this, and if it weren’t for the fact that someone needs to keep you from killing each other--as Hermione has far too much sense to be here herself--I would very much rather not be a witness to this flagrant rule-breaking.” She was grinning outright, though, and looking for all the world like there was in fact nowhere else she’d rather be.

Harry grinned back at her. “Noted--and as for that first bit, with the Room of Requirement out of commission for the foreseeable future, this was the only relatively private space big enough.”

“Relatively being the key word,” Ron snarked, as he glanced behind himself to Applewhite’s closed office door.

“I thought we agreed we weren’t going to worry about him,” drawled Zabini, as he wandered over. “We picked today specifically because we knew he was going to be out of the castle all night.”

“How do you know?”

“Because, Miss Ginevra,” Zabini said, “today is Applewhite’s anniversary, and he and his husband are spending the night at some grand hotel in London.”

“Wait, are you high?” she asked, incredulous. “Merlin, you are all idiots!”

"A bit, yeah," Zabini replied, snickering a little.

Ginny groaned. "So you're serious? You're really serious."

“I never joke about the ancient and noble art of wizard’s dueling,” Zabini replied, in an obviously over-exaggerated posh accent, before he continued more seriously, “I have it from Daisy Hiddleston whose older sister Louisa works at The Thestral and Crown which is owned by Applewhite’s husband, and she’s certain that the two of them are jaunting off to London all day and staying at Claridge’s tonight.”

Ginny turned to Harry and Ron then and said, witheringly, “There is absolutely no doubt whatsoever that you are going to be caught.”

“What? No we won’t!” Ron replied. “Leave off, Gin, it’ll be fine.”

“Are you kidding? This is _textbook_ , you pillock. I’ve read it in a hundred stories, heard it in every silly teen drama on the wireless,” she explained. “There is quite literally zero chance that you are going to walk away from this without being caught and punished. He’s going to come home early for whatever reason, and he’s going to catch you.”

“Oh relax,” Zabini said airily, “we’ve prepared for that eventuality as well. Have a bit of faith, would you?”

Ginny glared back at him. “Fairly certain that no force on earth could make me have faith in you, Zabini,” she said.

It was perhaps a bit more sobering a reminder than she’d intended, and a somber silence fell over the group for a long moment. It was broken only by the classroom door opening to admit Malfoy, Parkinson, Hopkins, and Susan. “I ran into them on the way, and they said they wanted to witness the ‘rematch of the century,’” said Malfoy. His face fell, though, when he took in the state of the room. “Everything all right?”

“Just grand,” Zabini said quietly.

He shook it off well enough, though, and went back to measuring out the proper distance between the starting markers, and when Harry glanced over to Ginny, she watched him for a moment, seeming to look for and find something in his face, and then dropped her head and shrugged her shoulders apologetically. “I was just telling everyone,” she said, injecting a bit more humor into her tone again, “that I’m planning on standing by the door so that when Applewhite inevitably comes in here and catches everyone, hopefully I’ll be quick enough to escape before he notices.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that,” said Malfoy, dismissively. “We’ve got permission to be here.”

“You do?”

Harry nodded. “Let it never be said that Ron isn’t a brilliant strategist,” he replied, grinning at his friend. Ron flashed him a thumbs up in return. They’d come up with the excuse during the little party in the Slytherin common room, and even though as the evening had wore on, the idea of actually having a duel seemed less and less like what they’d wanted, here they were, ready for it anyway. “Technically, we’re all here because some of us need extra help with some of our defensive charms.”

Susan, Hopkins, and Malfoy all raised their hands. The classroom door opened again, and MacDougal and their girlfriend Waverly Figgis came in. “Perfect,” MacDougal said, “‘aven’t missed anythin’ yet. Been workin’ on it, but just canna seem to get corporeal Patronuses yet. Right, Figgy?”

Figgis shrugged and grinned. “I’m oh so very hopeless at it.”

Ginny laughed and shoved out at Ron’s shoulder. “You could have just said something earlier, you bastard.”

“I think you know perfectly well that I’m not a bastard, wench.”

“I cannot even imagine what it must have been like to grow up with that many siblings,” came Malfoy’s voice in Harry’s ear. Harry shivered and wondered when it got so cold in the classroom.

“Might have been nice,” Harry answered, taking a step to the side. Malfoy came around in front of him. “Built-in friends if you were lucky enough to get along.”

Malfoy cocked his head, seeming to consider that. “Yes,” he then said, “might have been nice indeed.”

“All right, so we're all familiar with the rules of dueling, aren't we?” Zabini then called from the middle of the room. “The lieutenants have already attempted a last negotiation,” he paused a moment and gave a respectful nod to Ron, “but it was, as I'm sure our witnesses suspected, for naught. Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy’s disagreement remains firmly in place.”

“And just so we're all sure,” Ginny called, “that disagreement is what exactly?”

Zabini rolled his eyes. “Name something and they have probably disagreed over it, honestly.”

“Right, of course,” Ginny replied, “but specifically this time, what are they dueling over?”

“Oh hush you,” Zabini admonished. “Let us have this.”

“Right, it's nothing,” Ginny said, and then turned to address the group at large. “They’re dueling over absolutely nothing, people!”

“We’re all aware,” MacDougal responded. “An’ it’s more fun that way, innit?”

“So much fun,” said Parkinson, dryly.

“Moving right along!” Zabini interrupted, before anyone else could put in their two Knuts worth. “Gentlemen, to your markers, if you please.”

Harry took one last glance at Malfoy, who quirked his eyebrows cheekily at him, before striding forward and taking his place on the starting line. Malfoy joined him and, at Zabini’s direction, they shook hands, and then turned and took ten paces back. They turned again to face each other, and Harry suddenly groaned aloud. “You’re going to say it, aren’t you?” Harry asked.

“Say what?” Malfoy replied, cocking his head like he had no idea, but smirking like he absolutely did.

Harry shook his head. “Please don’t say it.”

“All right, all right. Bloody hell, Potter, you’re no fun at all,” Malfoy replied. “But hang on, just give me a second. It’s freezing in here.”

“What? No. Oh, oh no, Malfoy, no!” Ginny called across the room. But it was too late. Malfoy was already Summoning it from his pile of stuff near the door.

Harry knew in his gut that he was likely going to feel ashamed of himself later for his ridiculous visceral reaction to seeing Malfoy pull that damnable hoodie over his head, but in the moment, it was like a bull seeing a matador’s red cape. And yet it wasn’t anger, not really. It was a fierce, raw determination -- a gnawing, guttural curiosity -- an intense, insatiable hunger to get to the bottom of this thing that, even through the haze of his desire, Harry knew was petty and pointless at the end of the day. It didn’t matter that he knew its insignificance academically; the rawness of his feelings could no longer be ignored.

Because that hoodie, for whatever reason, had become a symbol of the mental roadblock in Harry’s head that kept him from moving on. It was a singular point of obsession. It was the thing that was always going to keep Harry from accepting that, once and for all, he’d achieved what he’d been born to achieve and now had the rest of his life ahead of him to do whatever he wished. He no longer had to pour himself, heart and soul, into one specific, bloody-minded purpose. He no longer had to work hard to solve the mystery and complete the task and destroy the madman. He was free to do anything he wanted, if only he could just let go.

He was across the room before he even noticed it, hands fisted in the jumper and face so close to Malfoy’s own that he’d gone a bit blurry. Harry heard nothing of what his and Malfoy’s friends were calling and shouting. He heard nothing but the sound of his own ragged breath, his rapid heartbeat, his blood pounding in his ears.

“You sure you want an audience for this?” Malfoy murmured. His lips brushed slightly over Harry’s own, and Harry jerked his head back, startled only by the intensity of feeling, the strange electric current that seemed to suddenly race through his body at the contact. It was enough, though, to cause Malfoy to trip forward. His legs tangled in Harry’s, and down they went.

The dam broke. Whatever the hell it was between them--years of pent-up aggression and confusion and anger and tension and fear and complicated emotional crap that Harry couldn’t be arsed to figure out in the moment--burst out. It was barely even fighting at all, as they were too close and too tangled up to do much of anything other than tug at each other’s clothes and yank each other around.

“What the hell is going on here?” The shout boomed through the classroom echoing off the stone walls, and silence fell immediately.

Harry froze as much as he was able to with his heart racing in his chest and his breath coming in harsh pants from the exertion of rolling around on the ground. Malfoy was now pressed along the entire length of him, with the exception of his hands, which were fisted in Harry’s jumper at his chest, serving to tug them impossibly closer somehow. Or at least to drag their lower bodies closer together.

He then realized two very important things very quickly--and if the sudden widening of Malfoy’s eyes was any indication, he also realized them at the same moment: that their precarious position had perfectly aligned his groin with Malfoy’s, and that his traitorous cock had taken a very keen interest in the scuffle. With the kind of haste he usually only reserved for making a dive towards a wayward Snitch, Harry shoved off of Malfoy and scrambled to his feet, certain that his face was as red as Ron’s hair.

No one said anything for a long moment, until finally Zabini strode forward, casual as you please, and held out a small piece of parchment, saying, “Professor Slughorn gave us permission to come here to practice our Patronus Charms, sir.”

“Er, so did Professor Sprout,” added Susan.

“An’ Professor Flitwick,” said MacDougal.

“Because that’s obviously what’s going on here,” said the intensely handsome man standing behind Applewhite, with his hands resting on Applewhite’s hips. “Babe, you really weren’t exaggerating about the ankle-biters, eh?”

Applewhite stepped forward out of his husband’s embrace, and Harry, quite unconsciously, reached for Malfoy’s hand. He had no idea why he did it, but he did, and Malfoy, for reasons he couldn’t figure out either, took it. Applewhite looked down at their joined hands and then back up. His mouth dropped open, and he looked for a second like he was going to rage at them, but then, he just shook his head and said quietly, “I mean, I get it. I really do. I’ve been there.”

“Get what, sir?” Malfoy whispered.

“Just shut up,” Applewhite replied, almost more to himself than anything. He said nothing again for a long moment. Then he turned around and addressed the group. “Ten points each from your respective Houses for obviously lying to your teachers about why you were coming here tonight. And two-hundred fifty points each from Harry and Draco for fighting like a pair of fucking children instead of the adults you’re supposed to be.”

“But sir!” cried Parkinson, rushing forward, but Applewhite held out a hand to stop her.

“Get out of my classroom before I make it more,” he continued. He turned back to Harry and Malfoy. “And I’ll see you both of you in detention when you get back from spring break.”

Harry swallowed hard. “Yeah, sir, I’d...I’d say that’s fair,” he admitted.

Applewhite’s face did something very complicated before he pointed towards the door.

Harry let go of Malfoy’s hand, caught up to Ron and Ginny, and left with only a bare backward glance at Malfoy. Malfoy stared down at his hand until Zabini came up and threw an arm around his shoulders.


	9. 50 Points, for Destruction of Property

“How the hell are you doing this so quickly?” Malfoy complained.

Harry looked back over his shoulder to see that Malfoy was easily two feet behind him now, but working diligently on a particularly stubborn-looking scuff mark. Applewhite had assigned them to scrub the Defense classroom floor without magic for their detention, and Harry smiled because the sight of Malfoy giving himself over to the task instead of trying to weasel his way out of it made something curiously fond grow warm in his chest. “Lots of practice,” he answered.

Malfoy looked up, eyes narrowed and skeptical. “When exactly did you have practice scrubbing floors?”

“Before I came to Hogwarts for the first time,” Harry replied honestly. He had no real reason to share this part of himself with Malfoy, and yet, in that moment, for whatever reason, he simply felt like it. “My aunt and uncle used to make me clean for them,” he added, a soft, wry smile coming to his lips at the understatement of it. He wasn’t bitter, though. He would likely never have much of a relationship with his relatives, but he wasn’t angry with them anymore.

“Oh please, you--” Malfoy cut himself off at something he must have seen on Harry’s face. “You’re serious?”

“I am,” Harry replied. He wasn’t sure suddenly if telling Malfoy about the kind of Muggles his family had always taught him to hate was all that good of an idea, but something inside him pushed him to keep going. “My aunt and uncle hated magic. I know now that they were really just afraid of it and that people have the deplorable tendency to hate what they fear instead of trying to understand it--”

“--subtle, Potter,” Malfoy interrupted.

“Wasn’t trying to be,” Harry replied tersely.

“Sorry, sorry, go on,” Malfoy said quietly, gesturing for Harry to continue.

“Well, because they were afraid, they used to treat me poorly. They’d force to me cook and clean for them, for years my bedroom was a tiny cupboard beneath a staircase in their house, and...worst of all, they tried to keep me from attending Hogwarts.” Harry paused for a moment, swallowing hard against the sudden lump in his throat. “But I did get out. I got here, and I thought for a while that it might be easy now. I’d been rescued, or whatever, from my crap life and brought to easy street.”

“But obviously it wasn’t,” Malfoy said. He’d averted his gaze and was staring at the scuff on the ground.

“Understatement, yeah?” Harry replied, trying to inject some levity back into the conversation.

“Do you think it hasn’t been hard for me too, Potter?” Malfoy said quietly, and Harry swore he could hear the hurt in it. “You think that coming back here and trying to go on after everything that happened over the last few years was _easy_ for me?”

“No,” Harry answered. “No, I know it wasn’t easy.”

Malfoy opened his mouth to retort, but then seemed to consider for a moment. He sighed and shrugged one shoulder, a wry expression coming over him. “Sorry...still sort of working on that whole ‘immediate urge to be defensive’ thing. It’s really hard for me to...to be good. To be worthy. It doesn’t come easy like it does for you.”

“Malfoy, it doesn’t come easy for me either.”

“No?” Malfoy said, jerking his gaze up. His grey eyes were sharp and shiny.

“No,” Harry said. “I have to make choices, same as you. I have to work at it.”

“Sure,” Malfoy said, but there was no petulance in it. Only resignation.

“What I meant, I think,” Harry said quietly, honestly, “was that even though there aren’t any easy answers...there isn’t an easy road, somehow you made it look easy this year. I just sort of looked up one day, and you were wearing that damn hoodie, and you were making friends with people that weren’t Slytherins, and you were smiling and laughing, and people were smiling and laughing back with you, and it was lovely, not painful, and I don’t know how you did that, but I admire you for that.”

The praise obviously took Malfoy by surprise, if the stunned, bright grin was any indication. It faded after a moment, though, and he was quiet and pensive again. Then, he asked, “Do you want to know how?”

Harry nodded.

Malfoy took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. He set the scrub brush down beside himself and leaned back against the wall. When he spoke again, he kept his gaze off somewhat into middle distance, but Harry knew it wasn’t because he was lying. Rather it was to keep himself put together as he spoke about something so difficult for him. “I just...you were right, I just sort of made a choice, Potter,” he began, “after you...after you helped me, that I wasn’t going to waste that opportunity. I decided that I would make an effort in a way that I never really had before. I was going to, I don’t know, I...was going to try. I was going to try to see what other people saw when they looked at me, and I was going to make them see someone...better than what I was.” He paused for a long moment, but Harry just waited. “I don’t even know if that makes any sense,” he added, with a soft laugh.

It did. “You put in the work, and it paid off,” Harry replied.

Malfoy nodded, more to himself than anything. “It paid off,” he echoed quietly.

They sat in silence for a long moment, with Harry fighting off the urge to cross the room and gather Malfoy into his arms. He wasn’t sure if Malfoy would appreciate it or not. Yet, anyway… “All right,” Harry then said, picking up his scrub brush and beginning to work again, “let’s finish this up before he comes back and takes points away for us breathing wrong or something.”

Malfoy took the offered out and picked up his own scrub brush. “Yes, yes, let’s finish. Although, honestly, Potter, I think you’re exaggerating the level of disdain he has for you. All I’ve seen is a man who takes away points when you fuck up, like he should. It’s not personal or anything.”

“Mmm, dunno about that,” Harry replied skeptically. “He hates me.”

“I really don’t think so,” Malfoy said.

“I do think so. He hates me,” Harry insisted. “Like actually, completely hates me! Which is”--he started to laugh, barely managing to speak sensibly through it--“weirdly the most normal thing about this year. A professor’s blinding and irrational hatred of me.”

Malfoy began laughing as well, which only made Harry laugh the harder. Malfoy had...Malfoy had a rather nice laugh, actually, when it wasn’t dripping with disdain or cruelly mocking. And it occurred to Harry then that Malfoy really hadn’t been cruel all year. Annoying, certainly, and frustrating, rude at times, a little disdainful, and often snarky, but never cruel. Funny, usually. Funny in the same sort of way Ron could be funny. Malfoy really had tried to put his best foot forward, and Harry did see it. He saw all of it.

“I rather like Applewhite,” Malfoy then said, when his laughter had died down. “And not just because he very reasonably and not at all irrationally hates your guts.”

“Because he’s good-looking, right?” Harry teased, before he could stop himself. He bit his tongue almost immediately, uncertain how Malfoy would take the quip.

Malfoy laughed and nodded. “And totally my type, as well,” he replied, before biting down on his lower lip. He waggled his eyebrows, flirting obviously now, and added, “Tall, dark, and handsome.”

Harry sucked in a breath at that. Because, well...it couldn't really be denied that Harry was tall, dark, and handsome as well, could it? Not that, well--Harry could certainly admit now, although perhaps not aloud yet, that holding Malfoy’s hand had felt really nice and Malfoy’s body against his own had felt really, _really_ nice and had led to some extremely pleasant (if perhaps just a bit confusing) dreams over the Easter hols. He’d liked it. He’d liked it a lot, despite numerous reasons not to like Malfoy in that way. His lips curved up into a shy smile that Malfoy returned.

“We nearly done in here?”

Applewhite’s voice from right behind him startled Harry; he’d been so focused on Malfoy that he’d tuned out everything else around him. Harry then shot to his feet, embarrassed at what Applewhite must have just heard, but very unfortunately, he backed up right into Applewhite’s body.

Applewhite dropped the thing he must have been carrying and it landed with a deafening crash. “ _Protego_!” he quickly cast.

The hastily-cast shield absorbed most of the damage, but one shard of glass managed to knick Harry’s cheek. Malfoy was at his side in a moment, and he cast a serviceable _Episkey_ to seal the cut.

“Professor,” Harry then said, hands outstretched in placation, “I’m terribly sorry. Was that, er, what was that? Or more to the point, can I fix it?”

“That was a foe-glass,” Applewhite replied flatly.

“Oh!” Harry said, smiling. “Okay, yeah, that’s fine, I can--I can repair that for you, sir, no problem. You know, had to learn how to fix shattered things pretty early. Glasses, you know.”

“That was a foe-glass given to me by my great-grandfather,” Applewhite continued, stone-faced and voice still terrifyingly even.

Harry dropped his chin to his chest and, clearly past the point of caring about the language he used in front of a teacher, said, “Oh fuck me.”

No one said anything else for several long moments. Harry chanced a glance up, but Applewhite seemed to have completely shut down. He then turned to Malfoy, whose return gaze was fretful, even though he seemed to be trying to reassure Harry that everything would be fine.

“I just...I just...I can’t anymore,” Applewhite suddenly said. “I can’t. I cannot. I--I--I just can’t. With you. I can’t. I can’t. I can’t. I cannot. Nope, can’t. Cannot.”

Malfoy’s eyes widened and he mouthed, _I think you broke Applewhite for real this time._

Harry bit down on his lower lip to keep the sudden, inappropriate and hysterical laughter from pouring out of him. Because he did, honestly, feel terrible. It really wasn’t like he was purposefully causing all sorts of problems for Applewhite. It was just...well, trouble really did tend to find him, didn’t it? Even when it was silly, petty stuff, trouble just came his way, and it seemed there was nothing he could do about it.

“Fifty points from Gryffindor, man. Seriously,” Applewhite said in a defeated voice.

“Seems a bit excessive, sir,” Malfoy said, before Harry could say anything in his own defense.

“And ten from Slytherin, Malfoy, come on now! You two are just...you--you, no, you know what? No.” Applewhite gestured like he was washing his hands. “I give up. I’m going to stop caring. I vow here and now that you two are completely beyond hope, and I’m done. Good luck to you both and get the hell outta my sight.” He was grinning, and his eyes were wide and harried, and for a moment Harry felt genuinely horrible.

Malfoy looked like he felt horrible too, but not horrible enough to keep from saying, “So do you suppose we could get those points back then?”

“Merlin, Malfoy, shut up!” Harry cried, grabbed for his arm, and launched him, laughing brightly, towards the door. “Sir,” he then addressed Applewhite, even as he backed up towards the door himself, “I am honestly, truly, very, very sorry about all this, and I will absolutely find a way to make it up to you!”

“Just get the hell out of here, kid,” Applewhite replied, with a soft laugh of disbelief.

“Yes, sir, of course, will do, and we will leave you alone, and this...this won’t happen again.”

“Fuck’s sake, Harry, just go!” he groaned.

“Yes, absolutely, going, right now, sir,” Harry insisted, before turning tail and running out into the hall, where he found Malfoy leaning against the wall grinning and with a mischievous glint in his eye. “You...you are something else, Malfoy, truly.”

“Yeah, Potter,” Malfoy said, tone softening a bit. “Always have been, actually.”

Harry just looked at him for a moment, searching for something. Then, quietly, he said, “I’m sorry I never saw it before. Seems like...like possibly a lot of wasted time. A lot of...missed opportunities.”

“Suppose we’ll never know,” Malfoy replied. “We can only go forward, after all.”


	10. 50 Points, for Being Out of Bounds Again

Harry surged upward, tearing at the Inferius wrapping its bony hands around his neck, and tried to take in a deep breath, but he couldn’t. He was choking. He was going to die if he couldn’t get it off of him, but no one was coming. There was no one to help him--

“--Potter! Potter, wake up!”

“Wha-what, Malf-- what are you--”

“--shhh, easy, Potter, breathe, you’re having a nightmare.”

Harry tried to listen and comply, but he still couldn’t catch his breath. The dream was too close, it was too dark in here, and his heart was pounding in his chest so fast, he was sure he was going to pass out.

“Potter, here, breathe with me. Can you do that? Match me, just like this…” Malfoy picked up Harry’s hand and placed it on his own chest. Harry flattened his hand and pressed perhaps a bit harder than he should have, but if it bothered Malfoy, he made no indication of it. Malfoy simply began to breathe slowly, counting in for five and exhaling for five. “That’s it, Potter, follow me. You’re doing very well. Just like this.”

Several long moments passed, and Harry began to wake up more as he calmed down. He was able to take in his surroundings and found himself sprawled on the big, comfortable couch in front of the fire in the Gryffindor common room.

They’d had a bit of a party, he remembered, to celebrate completing their NEWTs, and they’d invited all four Houses to attend. As the party had wound down, Ron and Hermione had not-so-sneakily disappeared up to Ron’s bedroom, followed not too long after by Dean and Ginny (which had to be awkward for literally everyone, and Harry’d hoped that they’d all managed to safely ensconce themselves behind Imperturbable Charms before anything was seen that could not be unseen), and Harry had not wanted to put himself in the position of having to crawl through his own bedroom knowing exactly what was going on in two out of the five beds. He’d cuddled up on the couch after offering sanctuary to anyone not from Gryffindor who hadn’t made it out by curfew. That must have been why Malfoy was here to witness Harry’s panic attack.

“Don’t be ashamed or anything, Potter,” Malfoy said quietly. “I...I’ve had them too. Not pleasant, but certainly not anything to be ashamed of.”

“I’m not ashamed,” Harry answered. He reached up and wiped his eyes, then scrubbed that hand over his face, as he sighed. “Maybe a little embarrassed, but not ashamed.”

“Oh...well, good then,” Malfoy replied a bit awkwardly.

Harry looked down and realized that he still had his other hand pressed against Malfoy’s chest. “Sorry,” he said, letting go.

“It’s okay,” Malfoy whispered. He was still sitting quite close, with his hip pressed against Harry’s thigh. He was warm and...and very near. “Do you want to go for a walk?”

“What?”

“A walk,” Malfoy repeated, sitting back a little and standing up. “Come on, you can walk me back to my dorm.”

Surprised by the offer, Harry found himself agreeing before he even had a chance to think about it. He stood up and started toward the portrait-hole, only turning back when he realized Malfoy wasn’t following him. “Aren’t you coming, or am I facing a loss of points by myself again?” he asked, lips curving up in an amused half-smile.

Malfoy returned it with a smirk of his own. “Just wanted to grab my hoodie...wouldn’t want to get cold,” he answered, before Summoning the offending thing from where he must have stashed it earlier on a couch across the room.

“You’re a real arse, you know that?”

“I very much do know that, Potter,” Malfoy sighed.

“Just as long as you’re aware,” Harry replied.

Once they’d climbed out of the entrance and were on their feet at the top of the Gryffindor Tower staircase, Malfoy gave Harry a look he couldn’t quite read and then, leaving no room for doubt, Malfoy quirked out his elbow to offer Harry his arm. Harry looked back and forth between Malfoy’s elbow and his face, searching for the prank or the moment Malfoy was going to snatch it back and laugh at him, but none came, and so Harry exhaled slowly and then slipped his arm through Malfoy’s proffered one. Together, they set off down the stairs.

“You know, I’d sort of been wondering,” Harry said, after a moment, “if this thing really was as soft as it looked.”

“It very much is,” Malfoy replied. “The inside’s all cozy and worn.”

“Warm?”

“That too, but I meant worn, as in well-worn. Lived-in, I think they call it.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “Well, that makes sense, as you’ve been wearing it practically non-stop since October.”

Malfoy chuckled at that. “You’d have done the same if you had one. But it was pretty well-worn before I got my hands on it too,” he said, teasingly.

The opening was obvious, and Harry really didn’t want to take the bait, but, well, despite knowing that Malfoy’s alleged and now-proven-nonexistent Hufflepuff boyfriend or girlfriend hadn’t given it to him, as well as knowing that he was being ridiculous getting so worked up over it, Harry was still curious. “If I just flat-out ask you, like I was planning at the beginning of the year, you’re not going to give me a straight answer, are you?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

“You could try,” Malfoy replied.

“Oh, that’s a ‘no’.”

“That is very much a ‘no’,” Malfoy teased.

“Fuck, you really are awful, you know that?”

“Again, Potter, I am quite aware. The real question is, what does it say about you that you’re attracted to me anyway?”

Harry stopped them in their tracks. “I’m not _attracted_ to you,” he insisted, but it sounded hopelessly weak to his own ears anyway. Malfoy just pursed his lips and stared at Harry until he was forced to admit, “All right, fine, yes, I am, Merlin help me, I’m attracted to you. No earthly idea why, though.”

“I think it’s because you want someone who can both keep up with you and challenge you to do more or do better, and,” Malfoy said smugly, “I like to think that I most certainly fit those qualifications.”

“Because you’re a total arse?”

“No, or, well, yes, partly--because honestly, Potter, you’re a bit of an arse yourself, you know--but really because...well, because...oh, fuck it!” Malfoy grabbed Harry by the shirt, tugged him in, and kissed him soundly.

Harry had only experienced a few kisses in his short eighteen years on earth, and all of them had been different.

With Cho, it had been wet and cold, and while he certainly didn’t blame her because she’d had incredibly complicated feelings and likely hadn’t been ready so soon after Cedric had died, the kiss had been painfully awkward and had quite honestly put him off kissing for a long while.

With Ginny, it had been soft and warm and sort of equaling the feeling he got when he was able to sink into a warm bath after a hard work-out. Kissing her had felt safe and easy, which wasn’t bad at all, but it wasn’t exactly what he’d always expected a kiss to feel like.

When he’d stood there and watched Hermione throw down her wand, run over to Ron, and sweep him up in the biggest, grandest kiss he’d ever seen, had watched Ron abandon all sense and lift her into his arms to kiss her fiercely back, Harry knew what he’d been missing in those soft sweet kisses from before.

He felt it now.

It was like Fiendfyre in his veins, rushing through him and threatening to devour him whole. He was being swallowed up by it, consumed by it. He was never going to be the same after this moment. The passion and the intensity overwhelmed him, and he gave himself up to it.

Malfoy sucked on his lower lip, and Harry moaned softly, as he wrapped his arms around Malfoy’s waist and pulled him in. Their bodies pressed flush together, and Malfoy ground his hips against Harry’s own, eliciting another agonized moan from Harry. Merlin, it felt so good. Malfoy felt so incredible, so good, so _everything_ \--it was too much and it wasn’t enough and it was everything in between.

“Come on, Potter,” Malfoy urged, sounding like the words had been punched out of him.

“Wha--what?” Harry managed, dazed and dizzy with want.

Malfoy turned suddenly and started towards the Slytherin dormitory portrait entrance at the end of the hallway. “Come on, you can walk me back to my room,” he said, in low voice.

Harry swallowed hard. “To your room?” he echoed, barely a whisper.

“If you like,” Malfoy replied, tossing it almost casually over his shoulder. He was tense though, Harry could see it in the rigid line of his back, but whether out of fear of rejection or something else, Harry couldn’t be sure.

He wasn’t ready, though, he knew that. “Wait,” he said, before reaching out and tugging Malfoy back. Malfoy turned around, and Harry wrapped him in an embrace again. He kissed Malfoy again, passionately, but a little less intensely this time. He let himself memorize the shape of Malfoy’s mouth, let himself sigh as Malfoy pressed even closer and slotted his lips between Harry’s, opening himself again like a flower to the sun.

The tip of Malfoy’s tongue touched his lips, and so Harry parted his more to allow Malfoy access. Malfoy hummed in the back of his throat, and Harry could feel his smile, which only made him smile too. Malfoy then gently sucked the tip of Harry’s tongue, and Harry’s knees went weak. 

“Potter, do you, er, do you want to--”

“--not yet,” Harry interrupted. “Not because I don’t want to, but just...just not yet.” He turned his head and pressed a kiss against Malfoy’s neck, burying himself there for a moment before he pulled back to look at Malfoy. His pupils were dilated, and his cheeks were flushed with color, and Harry had quite literally never seen him look so good.

“Okay, that’s...that’s fine,” Malfoy panted, nodding a little. “That’s good actually. I...we should wait a little.”

“Yeah,” Harry replied. He pulled back a little, smiling as Malfoy pitched forward just a little bit as well, inadvertently chasing him. “Soon though, okay? Because...well because Malfoy, I...I like you.”

That startled a laugh out of Malfoy, but it wasn’t malicious or mocking. He grinned and nodded. “I like you too, Potter. Astonishingly, rather a lot.”

“Yeah, who’d have thought, right?” Harry replied, chuckling.

Malfoy sobered, but only just, as he quietly repeated, “Who’d have thought?”

They stayed there like that for a long moment, Harry’s hands on Malfoy’s hips and Malfoy’s arms draped over Harry’s shoulders, staring at one another and smiling softly. It felt like a balm, Harry realized after a while. It felt grandly romantic in a way that most of the other moments like this in his life hadn’t. It felt like so much of his life had been leading up to this moment, and it felt like letting go.

Harry leaned in then and pressed one more soft, short kiss to Malfoy’s lips. “I should go now,” he whispered quietly against Malfoy’s mouth.

“Yes,” Malfoy replied. “It’s rather long past curfew.”

Harry chuckled and pulled back a bit so that he could look Malfoy in the eyes again. “I’m totally going to get caught heading back, aren’t I?”

Malfoy smirked at him. “Of course you are.”

“Yeah,” Harry agreed, shaking his head and laughing, “of course I am. Well, all right then, I’m going. Good night, Malfoy.” With that, he tore himself reluctantly from Malfoy’s embrace and, with only one look back to watch Malfoy walk down the hall and give the password to the portrait, he started back in the other direction towards Gryffindor Tower, only to be blocked when none other than Headmistress McGonagall herself turned the corner and stood in his path.

“It’s past curfew, Mr. Potter,” the Headmistress said, her stern voice softer than usual.

Harry looked up to meet her eyes, unable to contain the goofy grin on his face. Involuntarily, his hand came up and touched his lips, and he swore, however cliched it might have been, that they still tingled with the feel of Malfoy’s kiss. “I know,” he replied quietly, “I’m sorry, I was just…” He trailed off, staring back at the Slytherin portrait entrance, and his smile grew impossibly wider.

“I know,” McGonagall said, and when Harry turned back to her, her eyes were soft and kind, and her lips had curved into a half-smile. “Go on, back to bed with you.”

“Yes, Headmistress,” he answered, with a quick dip of his head in acknowledgement. He hurried past her and, after he’d got a few steps, he paused and turned back. With a sigh, he asked, “It’s fifty, isn’t it?”

McGonagall chuckled softly, and whatever tension she might have been carrying seemed to melt from her shoulders--it was a really great look on her. “Yes, Mr. Potter, unfortunately it is,” she then said. “Fifty points from Gryffindor.”


	11. 500 Points, for ‘You Two Idiots are the Actual Fucking Worst’

The Astronomy Tower seemed like an odd choice for them to have a date in, but Malfoy’d insisted, saying that the view was without compare, and that, as hard as it was to face what had happened there, he didn’t want to have to hide away from what he’d done anymore. He’d accepted his role in everything that had happened and he was sorry for it. Harry, for his part, might not have wholly forgiven him yet, but he was trying, and Malfoy had said that it was a start.

“I was thinking,” Malfoy said, leaning his head against Harry’s shoulder, as they looked up at the gorgeous night sky, “that, you know, since it’s my birthday and all, maybe we could...you know. If you might possibly want.”

Harry chuckled. “Funny, because I was thinking that since it was your birthday, maybe we could, you know, if you might possibly want, too,” he teased, hoping his tone sounded a little more confident than he actually felt.

They hadn’t got much further than kissing over the last couple weeks since their first, with the exception of Malfoy getting a hand down Harry’s trousers and jerking him off (which was very, very nice indeed), but neither had been particularly in a rush. Harry learned that Malfoy had only marginally more experience with the physical parts of being in a relationship than he himself did, and so they were both content to learn together.

“Er, yes, that would be...a nice present,” Malfoy said, sitting up again and licking his lips, possibly involuntarily.

Harry leaned over and traced his tongue along the same route, before sucking and rolling Malfoy’s bottom lip gently between his teeth. When he pulled back just enough to speak, he said in a low voice, “I was thinking maybe I could try sucking you off. If you wanted.”

Malfoy only nodded feverishly, as if he didn’t trust himself to speak. But when Harry slid down from the bench onto the ground on his knees in front of Malfoy, Malfoy stammered, “F-f-fuck, Potter, right here?”

Feeling bold, Harry grinned up at him. “Sure, if you’re up for it.” He could already see by the tenting of Malfoy’s trousers that he was indeed up for it.

“Merlin,” Malfoy breathed. “Yes, please, oh fucking hell, yes.”

“Since you said please and all...” Harry said, teasing. He then reached up with both hands and kneaded the meat of Malfoy’s upper thighs to give himself a moment to get oriented. He’d never done this before, which he knew Malfoy was aware of, but which Malfoy was seemingly wise enough not to comment on. Were their positions reversed, Harry probably would have done just the same, not wanting to miss out on the opportunity to have his cock sucked by accidentally putting off the bloke on his knees.

“Great start, Potter, but you’re going to need to get my trousers down,” Malfoy then said, as he slipped a hand through Harry’s hair and latched on.

The hand in his hair actually reassured Harry a little, but he couldn’t let the comment go by unremarked upon, so he pinched Malfoy’s inner thigh, eliciting a soft yelp from him. “Quiet, or I’m getting back up again,” he murmured.

“No, no, don’t get up, I’ll behave, I promise,” Malfoy answered.

Harry chuckled. “I have literally never known you to behave.”

“Potter, I absolutely promise to fully behave,” he replied, eyes wide and serious and very, very turned on.

“All right,” Harry replied softly. He then took a breath and reached up a bit to unbuckle Malfoy’s trousers. He slid them down past Malfoy’s hips, his mouth going dry when he realized that Malfoy, perhaps presumptuously, wasn’t wearing pants. “Fuck.” It slipped from his mouth quite without his notice.

“Maybe later if you wanted to,” Malfoy breathed.

“One thing at a time,” Harry murmured, eyes transfixed by Malfoy’s cock. He’d never seen one, besides his own that is, so up close and personal before, and certainly not erect like this, and it was a little overwhelming, but in a very, very good way. “What do you...what do you like?” he asked, his breath ghosting over Malfoy’s cock.

“Anything, anything, fuck, Potter, anything, please!”

“You know,” Harry said, leaning in a bit closer as he mentally calculated just how much he thought he could fit in his mouth without choking, “I’m about to have your cock in my mouth. The least you could do is call me ‘Harry,’ Malfoy.”

“You’re about to have my-my cock--fucking bollocks!”--Harry had given the head of Malfoy’s cock a tentative kittenish lick--“in your mouth, the-the l-least you could do is--Merlin and Circe and Morgana, all of them, fuck, Potter!”

“Work in progress, I guess,” Harry said. “Maybe we’ll get to first names by time our grandchildren are born.”

“Mmmph, Potter, please!” was Malfoy’s only response.

Harry decided that he’d stalled and teased enough. With a steadying breath in, he opened his mouth, leaned forward, and sucked the head between his lips. The sound it pulled from Malfoy indicated that he’d done very well indeed. Feeling a bit more confident, Harry inhaled through his nose and pushed forward, pulling more of Malfoy’s cock into his mouth until he felt the head hit his soft palate. Nervous again that he was going to gag, he pulled back, swallowing a little bit by reflex, and when he looked up at Malfoy’s face, he saw Malfoy’s eyes roll back as he groaned out his pleasure.

“Good?” Harry asked, letting Malfoy’s cock fall from his lips. He got a hand around it, though, not wanting to be a total arse.

“Nnngh, yes, Pott--Harry, yes, sosogood,” Malfoy slurred. His fingers tightened in Harry’s hair, trying to guide him back in place.

Harry followed his lead and began to suck gently, but rhythmically, building up speed and doing his best to respond to Malfoy’s cues. This wasn’t so bad, honestly, he thought. Maybe a little awkward, but Malfoy really seemed to be enjoying himself, and the sounds he was making, the encouragement and the praise, were all going straight to Harry’s own cock. He could, very probably, get used to this.

“Are y’all fucking serious right now?”

Harry froze just as Malfoy, too far gone to freeze, surprised him and came with a strangled cry in his mouth. He didn’t know what to do--should he pull back and expose Malfoy’s orgasming dick? And now his mouth was filling up with come which, well, he likely should have anticipated despite the fact that he’d never done this before--was he supposed to just swallow it down, or could he spit it out? It didn’t exactly taste bad or anything, but it certainly didn’t taste good either, and fuck, it just sort of kept coming now, didn’t it?

And dear Merlin, Applewhite was still standing there behind him watching this all happen, probably enraged or possibly gone apoplectic, and seriously, Malfoy, how much come could a single person come!?

After what felt like forever, Harry let Malfoy’s spent cock slip from his mouth so that he could turn his head and spit out Malfoy’s release onto the ground. It was much less than he’d thought it had been, which was nice, but Merlin, now his jaw ached from exertion, his face burned from embarrassment, and his legendary Gryffindor courage appeared to have completely abandoned him for the very first time, as he looked back up at Malfoy’s face instead of turning to face the music.

Malfoy looked down at him, eyes still a bit glassy from his orgasm, but also filled with the clarity that they were in _massive_ trouble. He reached out a slim hand and traced Harry’s cheekbone with his thumb, and his lips curved up in a shy, sweet smile.

“Fuck’s sake, Harry, get up off your damn knees!” ordered Applewhite.

Harry stood up and, frankly because in for a knut, in for a Galleon, reached out and helped tuck Malfoy back into his trousers. Malfoy gave him another grateful smile and then wrapped a hand around the back of Harry’s neck, trying to tug him closer.

“Have I died?” Applewhite asked. “Am I in hell? How did this happen to me? I’m a good person, I’ve tried to be a good person all my life, and is this what I get for all the good I’ve done?”

“Babe, you’re being a little dramatic, don’t you think?”

Harry turned at that, finally, and stepped to Malfoy’s side. Malfoy grabbed his hand and squeezed it.

Applewhite’s husband was stood there as well. He put his arms around Applewhite’s waist and rested his chin on his shoulder. “I think it’s sort of cute, actually,” he continued, before pressing a kiss to his cheek. “They’re young and in love and they just want to get a good shag in.”

“Awww,” Malfoy said, “ouch!”

“Don’t say anything,” Harry hissed under his breath and then loosened his grip on Malfoy’s hand a bit.

Applewhite glared at them both, but then, to Harry’s surprise, after his husband turned and whispered something in his ear, Applewhite exhaled sharply and bit down on his lower lip, the warm red in his cheeks deepening a bit with his blush. “That’s different,” he murmured.

“They were so coming up here to do the same damn thing,” Malfoy whispered in Harry’s ear.

“Draco Malfoy, I swear to god, if you say one more word,” Applewhite then said.

“How’d he hear me?” Malfoy muttered.

“You’re standing right there, fucking Christ!”

“Malfoy, shut up!” Harry groaned, raising up a hand to cover his eyes.

“You know what? Five-hundred points from each of you!” Applewhite said.

“Babe! -- Sir! -- Fucking hell!” All three of them cried out at the same time.

Harry then continued seriously, “Professor, you’ve got to be joking. That’s ridiculous. That’s literally ridiculous. That is a fucking ridiculous amount of points to take away.” He’d had enough. He’d had more than enough, actually. “Yes, we’re out of bounds, and yes, you caught us doing...er, what you caught us doing, but please, sir. You can’t take that many away. Please. Please don’t punish the rest of our Houses just because we cocked up.”

“Kid, honestly? It’s not even about that anymore. It’s about--”

“It’s okay,” Malfoy broke in. “It’s fine. We’ll...we accept the punishment. It’s, you’re right, it’s deserved.”

“Malfoy, what? No, no, this is totally unfair!”

“Gotta agree with Harry Potter, Wen, this is totally unfair of you,” said Applewhite’s husband.

“No, really, it’s all right,” Malfoy insisted. “Potter, it’s just House Points. Does it really matter? Honestly, does it really matter?”

“It matters to our Houses! It’s...it’s a matter of--of pride, it’s a matter of…” Harry stopped himself then. He thought about the fact that aside from Applewhite, professors had been handing out points left and right this year. He remembered getting five points for something as simple as waving hello to a Fifth Year Ravenclaw, remembered the look on Ginny’s face when she’d received two-hundred points for helping repair a set of portraits that had been damaged during the Battle of Hogwarts, and remembered seeing how happy Hannah Abbott was when she got fifty for Hufflepuff and pushed them briefly into the lead just for sitting with a Slytherin student at lunch. He thought about how the hourglasses in the Great Hall were full to bursting for the most part, and he thought about what those gemstones really represented.

Harry thought about the fact that at the end of the day, at the end of _year_ , the true accomplishment for him, for Malfoy, and for everyone, was that they had managed through force of will, through companionship, through wit, through commitment, through friendship, through hard work, through determination, through cunning, and through love to tear down their barriers and move forward in peace.

“Okay, sir,” Harry then said, as he twined his fingers in Malfoy’s. “Five-hundred points from each of us. Understood.”

“And accepted,” Malfoy added, giving Harry’s hand a squeeze as well.

“I--wha--um…yes. Yeah. Okay,” Applewhite stammered.

“Come on, Wendell, let’s go,” his husband said, tugging Applewhite back towards the tower door. “Let’s just go back to your quarters.”

Harry watched them go, a half-smile on his lips.

“They are _totally_ going to go shag.”

Harry laughed then. “Charming as ever.”

“Do you think he’ll return for next year?” Malfoy then asked, as he turned and pressed Harry back against a nearby pillar. “I mean, provided he isn’t sacked for excessive disciplining.”

“Oh, sure, of course he will,” Harry replied. “I mean, after all, we’re leaving in a few days, so he won’t have to worry about us anymore.”

“True,” Malfoy said, as he slid his hand down and grabbed a handful of Harry’s arse. “Can’t imagine anyone else has given him as much trouble as we have.”

“You’re a fucking menace,” Harry said, as he leaned in for another kiss. 

Neither of them said anything for a long time after that.


	12. The Leaving Feast, Part Two

Malfoy looked up at Harry, grinning. “You haven’t figured it out yet, really? I’m honestly disappointed, babe.”

Harry groaned. “No, no, I thought I said we were drawing the line at that.”

“I like it, _babe_ ,” Malfoy replied, over-enunciating like a real ponce. “Besides, Calvin calls Applewhite ‘babe,’ and it seems to work really well for their relationship. And Cal absolutely loves us, so I just think it’s only fitting.”

“Keep your bloody voice down, he’s got ears like a damn bat!” Harry said, laughing now, though. He shoved in between Malfoy and Nott and hooked an arm around his boyfriend’s neck. “But seriously, I think I’ve earned it by now. Can you please, please just tell me why?”

Malfoy pressed a quick kiss to Harry’s cheek, but then addressed his friends instead. “Has he earned it?”

Nott groaned. “I am staying out of this. I wouldn’t put it past someone to come over here and take even more points away,” he said, sliding down a bit further to put some space between them.

“Not possible,” Zabini said, though he looked far more amused than Nott did. He indicated the Slytherin hourglass, which had about as many emeralds as Gryffindor’s had rubies. “Because our fearless idiot leader and his fearless idiot boyfriend decided that shagging in public was smarter than using a bed like proper folks.”

“And here I thought you Slytherins were supposed to have that whole ‘sex god’ thing going for you,” Harry said, teasing.

“For shame, Potter, stereotyping like that. For shame.”

“Malfoy’s evil must be rubbing off on him,” said Parkinson, and then quickly raised a hand to forestall the inevitable terrible joke, “Don’t.”

Harry turned back to Malfoy then, eyes pleading, “So will you tell me? Please?”

Malfoy narrowed his eyes. “How about I refute one of your theories instead?”

“Which one?”

Malfoy leaned closer, eyes darting furtively back and forth in an overexaggerated suspicious way. “I have it on good authority that I’m _not_ shagging Susan Bones.”

Harry furrowed his brow and shook his head. “Har, fucking, har, I knew that already. And you’re not shagging Wayne Hopkins either, nor are you shagging any Hufflepuffs whatsoever,” he growled.

“Which I’m fairly certain should have been obvious from the beginning, Potter, really,” Malfoy drawled.

“I did dismiss that one fairly quickly, thank you very much,” Harry said. “I ended up dismissing all my theories, actually. Never had enough evidence.”

“And then stopped investigating--”

“--only to start...” Zabini finished for Malfoy. He rose his eyebrows and made a lewd gesture with his hand.

“Oh for Merlin’s sake, you’re all ridiculous! I’m trying to sodding eat here,” Nott burst in, throwing his hands in the air. “Potter,” he continued, turning to Harry and indicating Malfoy’s hood, “he bought it himself. Few weeks into term, after that trip to Hogsmeade, he came back to the dorms, pulled it out of a bag, and put it on. End of mystery!”

Harry bit down on his lower lip to keep from laughing. He turned to Malfoy, expression as stern as he could make it, and said, “Is that true?”

“For Merlin’s sake, Potter, of course I bought it myself! I thought it was hilarious, and I wanted to fuck with you. Actually,” he leaned in close to Harry’s ear, his lips brushing up against the outer shell, “I bought it _specifically_ to fuck with you.”

Harry wrapped his arms more tightly around Malfoy’s waist, letting his hands slip down just slightly past what was decent in public. “You know, that was actually my first theory,” he murmured. “Should have stuck with my gut.”

“It’s generally served you well so far,” Malfoy replied, grinning.

“But it’s also been wrong too,” Harry said significantly.

“Yes, well,” Malfoy said, brushing in a bit closer, “gut feelings can change, and you’re obviously good at listening to them and accepting.”

“Mmm, yes, I think you’re right.”

The kiss was soft and warm, the sort of chaste with just a hint of wickedness underneath that promised more and more if only it could be followed later. Malfoy tasted like the pumpkin juice he’d been drinking, and his tongue slipped along the seam of Harry’s lips for just a moment before he pulled back, a question in his eyes.

Harry laughed softly and leaned back in, closing his eyes and pressing his forehead against Malfoy’s own. “Ten points to Slytherin,” he sighed.

Malfoy groaned and shoved out lightly, making Harry fall back, laughing. “Good grief, Potter, you absolute cheeseball!”

“What! I thought it was cute!”

“It was ridiculous _babe_ ,” Malfoy replied, but the fondness in his tone only made Harry want to lean forward and kiss him again.

“Get a room you two!”

Harry pulled back and glanced behind him to flip Ron the bird.

“Weasley’s right, though, you two should absolutely get a room. You’re hideous,” said Zabini.

“I think it’s rather sweet,” said Parkinson dryly.

Malfoy brightened. “Really, Pans?”

“No, it’s disgusting, and I’m about to lose my supper,” she said, in the exact same tone.

Malfoy only smiled the brighter. “Well, thankfully, we’ve reached the best part,” Malfoy then said, as he began to slip his arms out of his sleeves, “which is that I can finally stop wearing this ridiculous thing. Honestly, whoever told Helga Hufflepuff that yellow and black was a good color combination should be hanged.”

Harry burst out laughing.

“What? It’s absolutely horrendous!” Malfoy continued, his voice muffled as he disappeared into the hoodie.

Malfoy’s hair was a riot once he pulled it over his head, and Harry reached out to smooth the strands down without a second thought. “I kinda like it,” he said, continuing to chuckle. “It isn’t great with your complexion though, admittedly.”

“Sod off, you, I look excellent in everything.”

“What if I got you the Gryffindor one then?” Harry offered.

“Ugh, absolutely not. One has to draw the line somewhere,” Malfoy replied, attempting to sneer.

Harry just laughed and leaned in to kiss that sneer until he felt Malfoy’s lips curve into a smile instead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading! You can show your appreciation for the author in a comment here or on [Livejournal](http://hd-erised.livejournal.com/69892.html) . ♥
> 
> This story is part of an on-going anonymous fest hosted at hd_erised @ livejournal.com. The author will be revealed January 9th.


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